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f,4 



AMERICAN 

JOURNALISTS IN 

EUROPE 



AN ACCOUNT OF A VISIT TO ENGLAND AND FRANCE AT THE 

CLOSE OF THE WAR MADE BY A PARTY OF EDITORS AND 

PUBLISHERS OF AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL PAPERS 

AS GUESTS OF THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT 

UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE 

BRITISH MINISTRY OF 

INFORMATION 



BY 

H. M. SWETLAND 

1/ 



Published by the 

UNITED PUBLISHERS CORPORATION 

New York 

1919 



Copyright, 1919 
UNITED PUBLISHERS CORPORATION 



529899 



•S<r 



SEP '<& 1919 



f 



P REFAGE 

IT was an afterthought which prompted the attempt to 
make a permanent record of the visit of the industrial 
journalists to England and France as guests of the British 
Ministry of Information. If we had fully appreciated the 
great opportunity afforded us, a detailed plan for making this 
record would have been inaugurated at the start. As it is, 
many important happenings have not received the attention 
they deserve. No apology is offered, however, for the lack 
of literary merit, as the effort has been solely directed to plain 
statement of facts. Plagiarism is frankly admitted, as the 
writer has used without stint abstracts from the various writ- 
ings winch have appeared in the numerous publications repre- 
sented by the party, and elsewhere. 

Our chief apology is offered to the British Ministry of 
Information for whatever omissions may have occurred, and, 
further, for so weak an attempt to cover so important a 
matter. Apologies are further extended to the various mem- 
bers of the party — many of whom would have given this 
narrative the literary distinction which it so richly deserves. 

H. M. SWETLAND 



CONTENTS 

Organization 5 

Men of the Empire 9 

Industries of England and France in Times of 

War 51 

In the Wake of War 59 

Westward Bound 69 

Personal Impressions 75 

Appendix • 103 



\r 


-M 



ORGANIZATION— I 



HE purpose of inviting American industrial journalists to visit 
England and France as guests of the British Government, was to 
promote a better understanding between the people of Great Brit- 
ain and the United States. The progress of civilization, as repre- 
sented by the English-speaking people, has been at all times dependent upon 
the facilities of individual and international intercourse. The importance of 
communication is indicated in the statement of Lord Avebury, before the 
International Paper Congress, that the development of modern civilization 
depends upon the discovery of cheap paper. This necessity for more inti- 
mate and comprehensive relations among all nations had always existed. 
The extreme obligations of war; the demand upon unity of action on the 
battle-front and in the production of munitions, and even the sentiment of 
the people, brought this necessity to the front to a degree that impressed 
its importance upon the observing leaders in both countries. Looking 
backward, we can easily determine that the first progress made by man 
came from the power of language, which gave him the facility of communi- 
cating the results of his observation, and of thus building a general store- 
house of knowledge. The second step came with the ability of mankind to 
record the developments so far achieved, and thus perpetuate and increase 
the common store. But the power of communication was the greatest 
factor. Wherever the facilities of communication were increased the prog- 
ress of civilization was hastened, and wherever they were lessened a rapid 
degeneration followed. Thus China, at one time in the lead of intellectual 
attainment, by cutting itself off from the progressive thought of other 
peoples, and by curtailing internal communication, lost its leadership among 
the progressive nations of the world. 

If civilization is, therefore, the cumulation of all intellectual develop- 
ment, every avenue of information must remain open, and our schools, 
churches, books and newspapers must have a broad outlook upon all intel- 
lectual development and a quick observation and a keen appreciation of 
intellectual attainment. Prior to the war our nations were so interwoven 



American Journalists in Europe 

with cable, mail and transportation facilities of communication, so bound 
by international organizations for the distribution of knowledge and so co- 
operative in intellectual development that civilization had reached its most 
advanced stage. 

In 1914, came the beginning of the greatest war in the history of the 
world. It immediately curtailed every form of national and international 
communication, until finally only general information could pass the censor- 
ship, and passport regulations limited the opportunity for personal, inter- 
national intercourse. The intellectual progress of the world was checked. 
Civilization became static, if not degenerate, at its most critical moment. 

The British Ministry of Information — 

It must have been a careful consideration of these facts that prompted 
Lord Beaverbrook to recommend to the British Government the establish- 
ment of the British Ministry of Information. This Ministry, under govern- 
mental authority, immediately undertook to re-establish as far as possible, 
facilities for international communication, and originated new and advanced 
methods of intellectual cooperation. It instituted an organization with 
headquarters in London, and branches in other countries, established a 
system of propaganda, and invited groups of citizens of other countries as 
guests of the British Government, to visit England and France. Every 
facility for observation and personal contact was afforded these parties. 
Meetings were arranged with the great intellectual leaders of the Empire 
and France. Their industries were thrown open for observation. The 
entire operation of the war, the production of its munitions, the transfer 
and transport of men and machines, and the activities at the front were 
bared for individual inspection of the members of these parties. Three 
parties were invited from this country, and each was given special facilities 
for individual observation and investigation. The first comprised journal- 
ists and writers, the second were clergymen, and the third, our party, was 
made up of fifteen publishers and editors of industrial papers covering the 
leading industries of America. 

American Industrial Press — 

This selection of the last group was undoubtedly due to the fact that the 
industrial publications of America are more highly specialized than in any 
other country, and therefore wield a potential influence on the great indus- 
tries which they represent. They are the only periodicals dealing directly 
with the great industrial problems of the nation, and their importance to 
American industries has been fully recognized, not only by the industries 

6 



Organization 

themselves, but by the Government, under conditions of exacting require- 
ment. A recent conference of American industrial editors was addressed 
by all the members of the Cabinet and the heads of important departments, 
to secure the cooperation of the industrial press in coordinating American 
industries with a Governmental propaganda of war. The services rendered 
by these specialized publications have received favorable comment from 
distinguished men of other countries who have given the subject considera- 
tion. Just as the daily press of the Continent differs from the daily press 
of America, in that its editorial expression is the dominating feature, whereas 
in America the daily press caters directly to news, so the industrial publica- 
tions of America, with their highly specialized individuality, differ from the 
business periodicals of all other nations. 

The personnel of the party, the journals which they controlled and 
brief statistics of the industries thus indirectly represented, are given in an 
appendix herewith. 

Instructions — 

Our party was organized by the New York branch of the British Minis- 
try of Information, under the direction of Sir Geoffrey Butler and Mr. 
Goode. We were given a week of preparation, and on the evening preced- 
ing our departure were assembled at Sherry's, where the objectives of our 
trip were laid before us. Sir Geoffrey Butler, who presided, informed us 
that our work would be divided into three distinct features: — 

First — We should meet the great men of England and France, familiarize ourselves 
with the social conditions of the two countries, listen to their great leaders and observe 
their hereditary and institutional customs. 

Second — We should visit their great industries in the period of greatest production, 
and confer with their industrial leaders. Full information would be given us as to their 
treatment of the great problems affecting the industries of all nations. 

Third — We were to be shown the operations of the great war. We were to visit the 
Grand Fleet and the battle-front in France. 

The 1 oyage — 

At noon, on the twenty-sixth of October, 1918, our party embarked on 
the Steamer Lapland, a troopship bound for "somewhere" on the other side. 
When we were off Staten Island we were anchored for twenty-four hours, 
and finally became a part of a great marine pageant. Ship after ship, 
loaded to the limit with men and munitions, passed us on its way out of the 
harbor. We counted over sixty, among which was the great Leviathan, 
with 11,000 men overflowing its decks and cabins and its hold filled with the 

7 



American Journalists in Europe 

great and small machines of war. Numerous warships and aircraft acted 
as escort. Two great captive balloons furnished further evidence of the 
watchful care bestowed on this monstrous convoy. We had now received 
our first impression — a picture of the magnitude of these preliminaries to 
battle, and the thorough manner in which precautions to avoid quick dis- 
aster were established. 

The next morning found us far out on the Atlantic. Only fifteen of 
the great fleet of the day before were to be seen. These were convoyed by 
a large cruiser half a mile ahead, and by a torpedo destroyer a mile or two 
astern. Our speed was cut down to harmonize with the speed of the slower 
ships, and our formation was not broken during the long, zig-zag course 
across the Atlantic. We were informed that we were now under military 
control, and that we were in a region of war. All lights outside were for- 
bidden at night, even to smoking. We were assigned to a lifeboat and 
daily drill, and were directed to wear the lifebelt continuously. Our course, 
which was only indicated to us by the difference in time and the tempera- 
ture of the salt water, was evidently in the direction of the Azores; from 
there we turned north, cleared the west coast of Ireland, and entered the 
Channel at the north. One day followed another in monotonous repetition 
without even one submarine scare. The only exciting event occurred when 
we were in the war zone supposedly infested with submarines. Up to this 
time we regarded the lifebelt as a terrible nuisance, but on this day we 
submitted without remonstrance to its kind protection. We watched our 
cruiser circle to the rear of the fleet and disappear over the horizon toward 
America, and our torpedo destroyer also deserted us at this point. We 
had an anxious hour before we were picked up by a convoy from the British 
Fleet, which escorted us down the Channel. But the greatest excitement 
of the trip was when the pilot came aboard bringing news, and the first 
papers we had seen since leaving New York. We crowded around Baldwin 
as he read the story of the surrender of Turkey, and the rumors of the sign- 
ing of an armistice. We learned of the great revolutions in Germany, and 
concluded with much rejoicing that the war was over. 




THE MEN OF THE EMPIRE— II 



ROMthe moment we landed on British soil we were made to feel 
the hospitality of the English people. Major Whitmore and other 
representatives of the Ministry met us on board the Lapland, and 
escorted us from Liverpool to London in a special car, where a 
luncheon was already prepared for us. We were a jolly party on the 
train, with songs and stories, and happy with the feeling that our voyage 
was over, and the "Great Adventure" lay just before us. 

Our arrival was marked by the overwhelming realization that we were 
in a country that knew the meaning of war. London was a city of gloom. 
The streets were so darkened that you had to "watch your step" in walking. 
Lights were showing faintly at the street corners, but they were carefully 
hooded so that they could not be seen from above. Taxicabs had tiny 
lights, and every window in the city was darkened. We learned from 
placards in the Hotel Waldorf that under penalty of arrest no curtain should 
be raised while the room was lighted. The only lights that could be seen 
from a distance were those that marked the entrance to an air-raid shelter, 
and their significance only added to the gloom. The congestion of traffic 
and travel also made us feel that we were near the scene of action. Luckily, 
the Ministry had provided special traveling accommodations for us every- 
where. Traveling independently would have been slow and difficult and 
impossible without governmental permit. 

England was not starving, but was "careful" of her food. We were 
given food cards which were issued to everybody. These were bordered 
with coupons which were clipped by our hosts, and allowed a portion of meat 
three times a week, a package of sugar which we carried with us, and 
various other articles of food. These coupons were more realistic than 
those clipped from American bonds, and gave the holder a sense of material 
value unaffected by market quotations. 

Whether or not England was economizing coal, the fact remains that we 
were cold from the time we arrived until we left. Small open fires and 
the ever-present whiskey and soda seemed to be the English substitutes for 

9 



American Journalists in Europe 

steam heat. We doubled our amount of clothing, and even appeared at 
formal dinners with sweaters concealed under dinner coats. 

Upon our arrival in London cables were waiting for us telling of the 
death of Mr. Baldwin's son. He was killed at the front. So our little 
party received its own baptism of war, and from this time could sympathize 
more sincerely with the sad but determined faces that met us everywhere. 
Our feelings were stirred by close contact with the people of a great nation 
bending every effort to a single purpose and enduring whatever of suffering 
to a single end, and a kindred feeling was permanently established, for this 
war was also our war. 

So perfect was the plan of the Ministry to have us meet some of the great 
people of their country and see the social side of English life, that they 
filled our days with one function after another. 

Lieut. -Col. Byllesby and General Biddle of the American Army called 
the morning after our arrival, and heartily tendered their services during 
our stay. 

Lord Mayor s Parade — 

The Lord Mayor's Parade occurred on the afternoon following our 
arrival. It was not inaugurated especially in our honor, but is one of the 
traditional spectacles of London. A great parade of soldiers from all coun- 
tries, captured cannon, floats showing the great machines and operations of 
war, escorted the newly elected Mayor from his home to his office. He was 
magnificently apparelled, and rode alone in a wonderful golden carriage 
which has been used on such occasions for centuries. We think of the City 
of London as the largest in the world, yet it is technically only a small part 
of the city as a whole. It comprises only the ancient tower and a section 
that was originally all of London. The municipal powers of this section 
do not extend over the other municipalities of Greater London, such as 
Westminster, and the Lord Mayor has jurisdiction only over this small 
municipality. 

Sutton Place — 

On November tenth our party was taken by automobiles to Sutton 
Place, in Surrey, where we were guests at luncheon of the Duke and Duchess 
of Sutherland. It was a long, cold ride for thirty miles out of London, and 
we were quite disappointed to find the only means of heat in the house 
was small fireplaces. The warmth of our reception, however, went far 
to adjust the difference in temperature. Sir Mortimer Wilson escorted us 

10 





SUTTON PLACE, SURREY. HOME OF THE DUKE OF SUTHERLAND 



The Men of the Empire 

to the reception room, where we were presented to the Duke and Duchess, 
Lady Essex, Mrs. Ward, General Fitzgerald, Captain Grey and Lieut. 
Bowles. 

The palace was built in 1520, and was occupied at one time by Henry 
VIII. It was magnificently furnished, and included a well-known art 
gallery filled with old paintings, antique furniture, wonderful tapestries and 
art treasures. The grounds were beautifully planned, with rose gardens, 
lily ponds and hot houses. The hard profile of the castle was broken by a 
line of magnificent Cedars of Lebanon, the seed for which was brought from 
the Far East hundreds of years ago. 

Reception by the Ministry — 

On the day that the armistice was signed, the Ministry of Information 
gave us a luncheon at the Savoy. We wore flags and decorations, and 
the occasion was made memorable by the significance of the day. General 
Sims presided, and gave us a cordial welcome. 

The following is from the minutes of the meeting: 

The Chairman: Gentlemen, we are met here today in this informal fashion in order 
that before you launch out on your rounds of sightseeing and tours of investigation, our 
Ministry may bid you welcome. From the very outset of your visit we want you to feel 
that you have fallen among friends. Trade, they say, follows the flag. We hope it does. 
Your flag has arrived long since. The greater the volume of that trade, the better we shall 
be pleased, for though, in a sense, you represent rival industries, we welcome your compe- 
tition as a salutary stimulant, and rejoice in the knowledge that your success, even though 
occasionally at our own expense, can spell nothing but additional prosperity for one great 
branch of the Anglo-Saxon family. 

Gentlemen, the thought may be passing through your minds that this was not always 
the case, indeed, that not so very long ago the outward and visible signs of brotherly affec- 
tion were all too few between our nations. May be, in those seemingly distant days of 
peace we on this side were a shade too self-satisfied — a trifle over-prosperous and lethargic. 
May be, you on your side, in the tempestuous vigor of your national youth, were a little 
impatient of Old World ways, of Old World creeds and dogmas. But, Sirs, it is only in 
the hour of calamity that a man first truly finds his soul — it is only in the hour of disaster 
that he discovers his friends. And, so, it has proved to be with nations. When the Cata- 
clysm struck the world, and our two countries were immersed in the crucible of war, all 
foolish fallacies and misconceptions vanished in a moment, and for the first time in a hun- 
dred years the pure metal of our peoples stood revealed — identical in the basic elements, 
nobility and purpose — identical in fibre, courage and resolution. In that great hour each 
found, not only himself, but a long-lost br< ither. Who can foresee the full result of that won- 
derful discovery? But the first fruits, at least, are already clear to us; civilization saved, 
freedom and justice guaranteed to all peoples of the earth. With these as a beginning, 
what may we not hope for the future in progress and in prosperity, if so be our two peoples 
only keep clean the white metal of nationhood, and cement with the ties not only of language 

11 



American Journalists in Europe 

and commerce, but also of joint responsibility in the common burdens of mankind, the 
newly-found and doubly precious brotherhood of our peoples? 

Gentlemen, it was thoughts such as these that inspired Lord Beaverbrook when he 
became Minister of Information. Born in that great Continent from which you hail, son 
of a kindly Presbyterian Minister, it was in the farms and villages of New Brunswick that 
he first breathed the pure air of America, imbibing with it a passionate and undying love 
for its forests and wide spaces, its people and their institutions. In due course he grew up, 
and the whirligig of fortune sent him far from home across the seas, there to battle in the 
centre of the Empire for a seat among the Great. Through each step of his career, through 
each advance into new realms of thought and activity, he carried with him the torches of 
the New World — Canada and the United States — illumining with them the darker corners 
of political apathy. Ere long, both in the political and business life of this country, his 
voice had become generally recognized as a trumpet of the New World, sounding out 
incessantly a clarion call for a better understanding — for a closer intimacy between the 
Anglo-Saxon peoples. What wonder then that when opportunity came to him at last to 
put his teachings into practice, he should be found eager and ready to grasp it. It was only 
in March of this year, as you probably know, that the opportunity arose, but in those few 
intervening months, despite the difficulties of organization, despite the weakness of a body 
all too frail to house so dynamic a will, his genius has succeeded at least in blazing a path 
in the right direction. 

"Let us get to know our kith and kin intimately, and let us help them to get to know 
us just as intimately," he repeatedly said. It does not sound very wonderful, but simple 
though it be, we believe that it contains potentialities powerful enough to sway the whole 
course of future history, and to affect in vital manner the future destiny and welfare of gen- 
erations to come. It was for that purpose that we invited you here. 

As you know, we are a War Organization, created in war for war purposes only. Great 
news has reached us today. On the last battlefront an armistice has been signed; our sole 
remaining enemy has confessed himself utterly and inevitably beaten. Thank God for 
that. The hour is none too soon. Indeed our hearts go out to those, of whom there is at 
least one among us, for whom it is already too late. 

I do not think it would become me on this occasion to speculate on the future of this 
Ministry. The sentiment of Anglo-Saxon kinship has already taken root so firmly that 
we may have confidence in its survival. Our principal duty of the moment is to strive 
to demonstrate to you the magnitude of the part which Great Britain and the British 
Empire have played in this war; to show you our Fleet, our Armies, our war industries, 
our factories; to indicate to you the awful upheaval of a Nation's life; the tremendous 
effort which has transformed a race of free and independent traders into a vast and com- 
plex machine of war. We want to prove to you that our purpose in entering upon this war 
was as disinterested as your own; that our purpose is based on finding a true and durable 
solution to the greater problems of the world; justice for all; peace and security for every 
race beneath the sun. 

We court your fullest investigation. We invite your criticism. Judge us as you find 
us. We will not attempt to influence your decision. But, Sirs, if your verdict should be 
favorable, I confess that we shall be glad, not only because we shall feel that our endeavors 
have been well worth while, but because also we shall then indulge the hope that fifteen 
more of our most influential kinsmen from the States are returning home, not as pilgrims 

12 



The Men of the Empire 

with their devotions paid and done with for another season, but as pioneers in a great, and 
noble cause, eager and willing to assist in lighting on every hilltop over their broad and 
beautiful country the beacons which shall announce to their peoples the glad tidings of a 
kinship rediscovered; of a brotherhood claimed and acknowledged by two great nations. 
Should this come to pass, the fine dream of Lord Beaverbrook will be near fulfillment, 
for the desire, the sentiment of kinship is already here in your country as in ours, and it 
requires but the hand of conviction, the spark of enthusiasm in both, to kindle such a 
flame of good-will and understanding as will assuredly burn brightly down the centuries, 
fed by an ever-increasing host of staunch adherents of the high ideals and standards of 
civilization, which are already preached and practiced, by the two great twin democracies 
of the World— those of the United States of America and of the British Empire. 

Mr. H. M. Swetland: I should be certainly lacking in the spirit of the day if I did not 
think it incumbent upon me to express the sentiment of our party by saying we appreciate 
all that is being done for us. I may say that we are almost jealous of the British Ministry 
of Information. That you should have been the first to have thought of this great plan 
of international brotherhood that is certain to bind these two great nations together, is a 
matter of inspiration. Now, how you should have happened to have selected this auspi- 
cious time, how you could have kept us out on the ocean thirteen mortal days waiting for 
this wonderful moment, is really beyond my comprehension, for I can safely say you have 
most successfully planned the hour of this reception. When America went into this war 
it went in as one great unit. We have two great political parties in the States, but when 
war was declared, I want you to know, if you don't know it already, that we became one 
people, one nation and one party, and we have been with you from that date. We may 
have been slow to accept our responsibilities, but I trust you will feel that we have in some 
measure made good. England and America, as usual, are on the right side of a great 
question, and as you said, so I will say that we did not enter this war for any commercial 
advantage. We did not expect to extend our domain ; we did not expect to gain commercial 
advantages from this great struggle, but we do expect to help you to uphold the great 
principles that constitute the basis of our joint civilization. Now, I feel that I am monopo- 
lizing the time of our real speaker, whom I shall now introduce to make the real response 
to this toast. 

Mr. A. J. Baldwin: I saw in an English journal the other day, in the House of Com- 
mons proceedings, that a Mr. Baldwin defended the Ministry of Information. I should 
like to say that if the Ministry of Information needs any defense they can be sure that 
there is another man by the same name who will be glad to appear. 

Someone has said about America that even God Almighty does not know it except 
that he knows it as an individual. This is a little difficult to understand, and many people 
do not understand our cosmopolitan nature, as we have so many nations in our country. 
In the little village where I live there are 6,400,000 foreign-born or the children of foreign- 
born parentage; New York, with 8,000,000 of people, has eighty per cent of its people 
foreign-born or of foreign-born parentage. These various elements in our midst make up 
America, so whatever our outward appearance may be we want you to understand that 
America has a British heart. When the world saw the British Empire confronted with a 
sudden option as to whether it must break its plighted word to little Belgium, and grow 
rich and opulent as a neutral in the world struggle, or remain true to its traditions and 
prove once more in the world that there is such a thing as National Honor and National 

13 



American Journalists in Europe 

Morality, they saw her rise, every woman and every man, rise to the emergency to defend 
the National Honor of England. Then it was that the learned German psychologists who 
had been planted in our universities, the learned German physicians who were all over 
our land taking observations of our patients, reported back that America was neutral, and 
a little later, when the Lusitania was sunk and gone, these famous people took the tem- 
perature of the patients again, made their diagnosis and reported back that America was 
unmoved. There they made the mistake, they did not use the stethoscope to determine 
the heart-beats of America, and so they went on and went on until the decision came, and 
when the decision came America rose as one unit, first disposing of these elements in our 
midst which had been planted there for the purpose, and since that time we have been 
with you in all that is in us, as we were before in our hearts. But at a time like this when 
the glad news is here it seems so wonderful that certain things should have happened. 
Why before we left the other side that triumphant march of General Allenby into Jerusa- 
lem — what a picturesque thing, how the imagination comes after all these centuries — had 
taken place. I have read somewhere — I am not sure of my English — but there is said 
something about how a certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among 
thieves. That was a long time ago, but it was regarded as a solemn fact, and it is a strange 
thing that for 2,000 years it has been impossible for a person to go from Jerusalem to 
Jericho without falling among thieves. I believe from now on, on account of the great shel- 
tering army of the great nations that always stood for truth and honor, and rightly so, you 
and I, or anyone else will be able to journey from Jerusalem to Jericho without falling 
among thieves. The last official communique I saw published from the Turkish Govern- 
ment read like this: "We are retiring and the enemy is following step by step." Now I 
do not know, but I should say as a matter of fact that General Allenby was giving the 
Turks the greatest Turkey Trot the world has ever known. I do not know that the Turkey 
Trot has ever been popular in the British Empire, but I judge from now on it will be a 
popular dance, because compared with the Barn Dance which some of us in our childhood 
used to know, the future Turkey Trot will be like Chopin's Funeral March. Is it not 
glorious that the English are passing through the Dardanelles and coming to anchor at the 
gateway between the East and the West, removing forever that dividing line that has 
stood between the civilization of the world and Asia, removing forever that barrier that 
has made it impossible to put down the outrageous happenings that have transpired for 
centuries in the Holy Land? And then, too, is it not wonderful to think that your General 
Haig, in all the might and power of the Empire, was able to march back across those blood- 
stained fields into Mons? And then, too, our own little part. Just think that fifty years 
ago almost to the day General Moltke won his famous victory at Sedan over the French 
and so inflamed the German Empire that he made war their one ideal. To America, 3,000 
miles away, it was reserved that she should come and take the place, and she came in the 
name of peace, with the only object of making war impossible for ever. Do you know, 
it is a little hard to dispose of an occasion such as this without some remarks in regard to 
the ones who have plunged this world into misery? I should like to refer you to a letter 
which was written by a boy to his parents just after the Sixty-ninth Begiment had taken 
part in an advance. He said: "Dear Pa: — We went over the top this morning, and I got 
a bit of a scratch on my leg, and I am in hospital. I wanted to write you because I knew 
you would be glad that before I dropped out I sent three Germans straight to hell." When 
the Censor saw that letter he took out that last word, and added a note — "It is not per- 
mitted to speak of the German headquarters." The last official announcement I saw of 

14 



The Men of the Empire 

the happenings in Berlin was a speech by the President of the Mouse of Lords of Prussia, 
in which he wound up by saying: "The Kaiser is the first in Prussia, Prussia the first in 
Germany, and Germany the first in the world." Well, now today, if they will let us add 
one little word, it will read something like this: "The Kaiser the first in Prussia, Prussia 
the first in Germany, and Germany the first in the lower land." How else can we refer 
to those people? How else can you refer to a man, to a nation, who respects not the laws 
of God, not even the name of the Most High? How else can we refer to a nation of people 
who do not respect these solemn obligations between nations, which through centuries have 
been set up, these obligations called international law; how else can you refer to a people 
or a nation that holds not sacred those laws which are common to all mankind, the sacred 
things of life, and the relations of wifehood and motherhood? How else can you deal with 
it except to deal with it in terms we have done? We in America appreciate what you are 
doing for us today on behalf of the British people. You have always had the reputation 
of being reserved, and I am so glad that you are making the advances now because I assure 
you they will be received. There are a great many problems that must be worked out, 
there may be occasions that will create misunderstandings. I think that few people can 
comprehend the magnitude of the plan which America conceived and is now in the process 
of carrying out to accomplish the desired end. A programme so great that figures mean 
little. Twenty millions of our workers are today engaged in the manufacture of the ele- 
ments of destruction, and tomorrow the contracts will be cancelled. There were no ma- 
chines in America to do these things, and our first effort was to make the machines and 
then man them, with a result that our men who used to receive four dollars a day, are now 
receiving ten and twelve dollars a day. Then there were not enough, so ordinary mechan- 
ics, ordinary laborers, were picked from the common walks of life and were taught these 
trades, with a result that they are now earning ten and twelve dollars a day whereas not long 
ago they never received more than two dollars. What is the result? These men with 
their families raised their standard of living and tomorrow it ends. With the sudden 
cessation this is one of the readjustments that we will have to deal with, and I am afraid 
that if we are to keep these laborers engaged it must be by means of artificial laws. I 
daresay you in England have much the same problem, and it is to this problem of recon- 
struction that your nation and our own must turn in this great time. I want to say this: 
We never had an army, and we did not want one, and that was all on account of the treaties 
made by our forefathers. In your strength which you have demonstrated to all the world, 
we want to stand with you face to face that there may be no difference or distinction be- 
tween our common heritage, our common ambitions, and our common land. 

Mr. Dodge, in proposing the health of General Sims and Major Wrench 
paid a high tribute to the Ministry of Information, to its Chiefs, and the 
members of the Staff. 

Major Wrench: I want to thank you very much indeed for drinking the health of 
General Sims and myself, and I should like to take this opportunity of asking you all to 
show your sympathy with a member of this party. When I had the pleasure of meeting 
you at Euston on Friday night, it was my unfortunate duty to tell one of the party that 
very bad news was awaiting him — that he had lost his son. I want to pay this mark of 
respect to Mr. Baldwin, who has lost his son, for I think on a day like this it is the hardest 
of all. I ask you if you will just stand up for five seconds in silence as a mark of our 

15 



American Journalists in Europe 

sympathy to Mr. Baldwin in his great loss, and in the memory of all these men from your 
country across the Atlantic, from our Empire, from France and from the other countries. 

The company stood in respectful silence for five seconds. 

Major Holland: I want to say how much the last suggestion of Major Wrench appeals 
to many of us. I am taking this duty upon myself because I know that Mr. Baldwin's 
loss is so recent, and therefore so acute in his memory, that he probably would like me to 
do justice to it. I did not stand, because I am in the same position. I also lost my only 
son in this war — it is some months ago now — but the extreme bitterness of the grief has 
passed away. I am sure that Mr. Baldwin like myself would say if I had a dozen sons I 
would give them all to arrive at such a day as we have arrived at today. The grief, of 
course, being human as we are, is natural, and it is an added grief to think that having 
arrived at such a day as this we have not those gallant boys with us to share the joy which 
we share with all civilized humanity in the great victory we have achieved. What we all 
feel, I am sure, is this, that not only does today signify the triumph of all that right-thinking 
men hold dear over the baseness which has plunged the whole world in misery, but it has 
effected this — it has brought into active real sense the brotherhood of the two nations 
which have perhaps been too long separated by misunderstandings of each other's charac- 
teristics. I ask what should ever have separated us but those misunderstandings which 
occur so often even in families, to say nothing of nations. But thank God for one thing 
that the Kaiser has done, which he never dreamt of doing, and that is that he has welded 
together in bonds which are absolutely indissoluble the American and the British nations. 

English-Speaking Union — 

One of the first functions that we attended was a luncheon given by 
the English-Speaking Union, at the Criterion Restaurant, at which were 
present several hundred members and guests, and which was presided over 
by Sir Arthur Steele Maitland, Bart., M. P. Besides the members of our 
party, there were seated at the guests' table: Hon. R. P. Skinner, American 
Consul General; Lord Desborough; Bight Hon. Sir Gilbert Parker, Bart., 
M. P.; Sir Charles A. Hanson; Right Hon. John Hodge, M. P.; Major 
Wrench; Sir Campbell Stuart, K. B. E.; Mr. W. A. Ackland; Hon. G. Flem- 
ing Moore; Sir Harry Brittain, K. B. E. 

The toastmaster in England assists the host in the conduct of the 
dinner by making announcements in a loud voice behind the speaker's 
chair: "My lords and ladies, give attention to the toasts, His Majesty, the 
King — His Excellency, the President." 

The response for our party was made by Henry G. Lord of Boston as 
follows: 

Mr. Chairman, My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen, it is my very pleasant privilege to 
respond to your most cordial welcome. Your cordiality has been manifested to us from the 
very moment of our landing. It is a privilege that none of us can fail to appreciate and 
cherish to our dying day, that we have been able to be with you on the great day of days, 
yesterday. (Hear, hear and applause.) Every American in our party felt thrilled to the 

16 



The Men of the Empire 

core when he heard the hoom of the maroons at eleven o'clock yesterday. I was passing 
through Trafalgar Square when the first gun sounded ; I was alone. Directly next to me was 
a British officer, and in the thrill of joy and exhilaration I turned to that man and clasped 
his hand, and he gave me a cordial response. I knew he was a British officer, and I fancy 
he did not need any explanation from me that I was an American, hut with our natural 
desire to enlighten the world I thought it only fair to tell him so, and the result was an 
even more cordial grasp, and we went on to the Palace chatting together like old friends. 

It seems to me, gentlemen, that we are in a higher atmosphere in these wonderful days 
that we are living in, and in this rarer, purer atmosphere there is a great opportunity to 
break down the barriers of traditions and restraint and differences in temperament that so 
often lead to misunderstandings. I think sometimes that the very fact that we speak 
the same language is often the cause of misunderstanding between the different branches 
of the English-speaking peoples. Because we speak alike we are so apt to think that we 
are going to act alike in all circumstances. We fail to recognize the difference of racial 
characteristics. If we met Frenchmen or Italians, the very fact of the difference in lan- 
guage makes us realize that they think perhaps along different lines, and we fail to realize 
that between the average Englishman and the average American there is really great 
difference in the less essential details of matters of communion together. Nevertheless, 
it is these little things that constitute the daily intercourse of life. Fundamentally, we 
think alike. We have the same ideals of sportsmanship, fair play, decency, justice and 
honor; and let us never forget that in these fundamentals we have a foundation strong 
enough and broad enough upon which to build a structure which cannot be overcome by the 
mere misunderstanding of minor details which are bound to arise. And in this opportunity 
which is now with us, with hundreds of thousands, yes, millions of Americans on the Con- 
tinent, it is a wonderful thing that these men should have the privilege of taking back to 
America the impressions that they have gained here to enlighten their friends and families. 

This morning I was in the Eagle Hut of the Y. M. C. A., and the secretary in charge 
showed me on the wall a map twenty feet long, — it was covered with little flags, tiny Ameri- 
can flags. I said to him: "What do these flags mean?" and he said: "We ask every boy 
coming into this hut to pin a little flag on the city or town from which he comes." That 
map impressed me as nothing else has done with the extent of the great crusade that has 
taken place from America to the old world. That map was literally covered with these 
little flags put there by men who had had no idea of ever visiting France or England, and 
each one of these men has gained impressions which he is taking back to the United States, 
and what he tells his friends and his family there will to a great extent influence the opinion 
which the United States has of the old world. They are the voters of the future; many of 
them are voters today, but they will be more influential as the years go by. They are the 
men who are going to create public opinion; and, gentlemen, it seems to me that such 
Unions as yours can do an invaluable amount of good in promoting the right sort of feeling 
and good fellowship between the English-speaking peoples. I hope it may not be out of 
place for me to say here that the work of your British Ministry of Information seems to be 
along very practical lines toward this great end, not only in our own visit — which I under- 
stand is one of several others paid by American journalists — but in the work which they have 
done in sending to us your representatives to tell us the story of what the British Empire 
has done. We are a very responsive people. We like to know, but we must be told; and I 
think it is too much, if you will permit me to say so, a trait of an Englishman to rather take 
it for granted that if he does a good thing it speaks for itself. That is a highly creditable 

17 



American Journalists in Europe 

attitude to take, but remember that we are 3,000 miles away. We can understand 
what we are told; we can understand what we read, but we are not mind-readers, and we 
must be told of the things that are not printed, and which are not so fully known in the 
United States as you fancy. Therefore, I say that every means that you can take through 
your organized channel, the British Ministry of Information, is a very wise step, and 
particularly at this time. Don't let the work stop here. Let it go on in these crucial times. 
Another very good thing they (the Ministry) have done, and which has come under our 
observation on our trip over here, is this, — they sent twenty-five or thirty young officers 
over to speak and to lecture throughout the great expanse of our country. In that they 
did a very, very wise thing, and they chose a splendid lot of young men. Those young 
men traveled through our country from the North to the West, from the Pacific to the 
South, telling the story of the war, and themselves examples of the sacrifice which your 
boys were making ; and they did it in such a nice way that they won friends wherever they 
went. And it had a very practical effect. So many people in those far Western States of 
ours had never seen an English soldier before. They knew from his uniform that he was 
not an American, but they had no idea what he was until they were told, and it was really a 
revelation to them to meet and hear a British officer tell them first hand the story of the 
great fight on the Western front. It had a very direct effect in some instances. We had 
some labor troubles in America; perhaps you have had them here, where the working people 
do not fully recognize the importance of keeping supplies going to the men at the front. 
On one of these occasions a young British officer was asked to go out to the works and 
speak to the men. The men were just on the point of going on strike for what seemed an 
exorbitant demand for wages. That young fellow went out there and spoke to those men, 
one section of whom were foreigners. His remarks had to be interpreted. Those men, 
after hearing him speak, went back to work and they stayed at work, and the proprietor 
of the establishment said that for the next few weeks the efficiency of the men had been 
increased from ten to twenty-five per cent. That is a practical demonstration of what the 
British Ministry of Information has been doing, and I hope it may be continued. 

Our own party is just at the beginning of "our great adventure." If we may judge 
of the future few weeks from what has occurred in the past few days, I know all of us feel 
that it is the privilege of a lifetime. A great opportunity has been given us, and with it 
comes equally great responsibility. We have been chosen because we were representatives 
of many of the different great industries of the United States. We have been invited to 
investigate, to observe, to criticise if we will ; there are no obligations ; our tongues are not 
tied. We are asked to go back and tell and write what we have seen and what we have 
felt. That responsibility is a great one, for, as the Chairman has said, the business papers 
in our country occupy a very important position. They are read by a very influential class 
of people, a class of people who to a large extent form public opinion. That responsibility 
rests deeply on all of us; but. ladies and gentlemen, let me assure you that we came over 
in the fullest sense in the most hearty sympathy with the sentiments that have been ex- 
pressed here today and on every occasion when we have met, and I hope that we may fulfil 
our mission, so that when we go home what little we may say, what little we may do, may 
tend to promote the good fellowship and greater cordiality which must and will exist be- 
tween the English-speaking peoples. (Applause.) 

The aim of the English-Speaking Union is to aid inter-communication 
between the English-speaking peoples of the world. It desires no formal 

18 



The Men of the Empire 

alliances. It has nothing to do with the Government, but is an independent 
organization to promote goodfellowship among the English-speaking dem- 
ocracies of the world. The English-speaking peoples possess a common 
heritage, their language, sympathies, traditions and ideals. The 3,000 
miles of unguarded frontier between the United States and Canada is an 
example of the relationship between the two great English-speaking nations. 
The task which the Union is now undertaking is to perpetuate and extend 
this brotherhood for all time. 

Creed — Believing that the peace of the world and the progress of man- 
kind can be largely helped by the unity in purpose of the English-speaking 
democracies we pledge ourselves to promote by every means in our power 
a good understanding between the peoples of the United States of America 
and the British Commonwealth. 

Membership — Open to citizens of the United States of America and British 
subjects. The English-Speaking Union is non-partisan, non-sectarian and 
is open to men and women alike. It does not concern itself with the internal 
politics of the English-speaking peoples, and membership does not in any 
way conflict with the duties of good citizenship. It is realized that each 
member's first duty is to the land of his birth or adoption. 

Practical Objects — To establish branches wherever the English language 
is spoken, with the view of promoting locally every movement which makes 
for the friendship of the English-speaking peoples. To extend the hand of 
welcome in every country to English-speaking visitors. To make the Eng- 
lish-speaking peoples better known to each other by the interchange of 
visits, by correspondence, by the printed word and lectures, by an inter- 
change of professors and preachers, by sporting contests, and by any other 
means. To publish a magazine devoted to the cause of the English-Speak- 
ing Union. To take every opportunity through the press and otherwise 
of emphasizing the traditions and institutions possessed in common by 
the English-speaking peoples. The headquarters of the English-Speaking 
Union to be in Washington, D. C, and London, England. 

The London organization has for its president the Bight Hon. A. J. Bal- 
four, 0. M., and Ex-President Wm. H. Taft is president of the American 
branch. Major Evelyn Wrench of the British Ministry of Information 
is Chairman of the General Committee. 

British Newspaper Conference — ■ 

A most impressive occasion was the dinner given on November thir- 
teenth at the Savoy as a welcome to our party by the British Newspaper 

19 



American Journalists in Europe 

Conference. As has been stated, the Englishman demands quite a different 
publication at his breakfast table than is furnished a citizen of the United 
States. The editorial comment on the events of the day, and on the things 
which should happen tomorrow constitute the dominating features of a 
Continental daily. The news of the morning is in the paper, but you have 
to look for it. It is not thrown at you on the front page with glaring head- 
lines, as in America, where each paper emphasizes the importance of his 
news item with a funeral-faced type and an extravagant use of ink. No 
subject is too subtle or too intricate to receive intelligent editorial com- 
ment, provided the matter is considered of national importance. It is easy 
to understand the tremendous influence of these papers when you have 
observed the calibre of the men who are conducting them. 

At this Conference Lord Burnham, publisher of the Telegraph, acted as 
Chairman, and the following is the list of guests and a report of the meeting 
as published in the Telegraph: 

Mr. A. J. Baldwin (Press Association, British Papers), Lord Bobert Cecil, Hon. James 
M. Beck, the Lord Mayor (Sir Horace Marshall), Mr. Oscar P. Crosby, General Sir Ian 
Hamilton, Mr. W. C. Macon (Editor The Iron Age), Mr. Louis Baemaekers, Mr. B. M. 
Collins, Brigadier-General Sir Cecil Lowther, Mr. F. W. Parsons (Editor Coal Age), Dr. G. W. 
Prothero, Mr. Milton V. Snyder, Mr. G. H. Boberts, Mr. S. 0. Dunn, Mr. Arthur J. Baldwin, 
Captain Twining, the Attorney General, Mr. Paul D. Cravath, Mr. Winston Church- 
ill, Mr. H. M. Swetland (President, United Publishers' Corporation), Mr. Irwin Laughlin, 
Sir Theodore Cook, Sir Boderic Jones, Sir Beginald Hall, Major Evelyn Wrench, Mr. 
Wilson Cross, Mr. Lafayette Young, Mr. H. S. Perris, Sir A. Jeans, Sir Henry Dalziel, 
M. P., Mr. T. P. O'Connor, M. P., Mr. 0. B. Baldwin, Sir F. Swetenham, Mr. B. D. 
Blumenfeld, Mr. David Beecroft, Mr. Lyle Samuel, Mr. Sheriff Fletcher, Mr. Sheriff 
Smith, Sir George Biddell, Sir Chas. Hanson, Sir Harry Brittain, Mr. J. Heddie, Mr. H. E. 
Taylor, Colonel Eliott, Commander Boys, Mr. H. C. Parmelee, Mr. F. E. Powell, Major 
Holland, Mr. Chester Beatty, Mr. Gomer Berry, Colonel Slocum, Sir Arthur Pearson, 
Mr. E. H. Darville, Mr. Thomas Marlowe, Mr. E. Cunard, Mr. J. A. Spender, Sir A. Hope 
Hawkins, Mr. Ed. L. Keen, Sir Clement Cook, Mr. A. W. Clark, Sir Alfred Bobins, Mr. 
J. B. Scott, Major Brinton, Mr. J. M. Tuohy, Sir E. Buggles-Brise, Mr. Bobert Donald, 
Major Dunning, Mr. Archibald Hurd, Sir H. Morgan, Mr. G. W. McKinley, Sir Edmund 
Bobbins, Mr. Fredk. F. Cutler, General A. D. Macrae, Mr. G. B. Sims, Mr. Carmichael 
Thomas, Chevalier T. Sambucetti, Mr. A. G. Gardner, Mr. W. L. Griffiths, Mr. H. Cole 
Estepp, Mr. W. J. Evans, Mr. B. W. Allen, Mr. W. L. Courtney, Mr. A. S. Draper, Mr. 
F. Glass, Mr. A. W. Mann, Captain A. E. Spender, Mr. E. H. Butler, Sir Bobert Bruce, 
Mr. F. B. Kent, Mr. E. B. Piper, Mr. H. C. Bobbins, Mr. F. W. Wile, Mr. Edward Ware 
Barrett, Mr. Howard d'Egville, Mr. F. W. Doidge, Mr. Herschell Jones, Mr. G. H. Mair, 
Mr. Edward O'Hara, Mr. W. A. Paterson, Mr. E. L. Bay, Mr. H. A. Vernet, Mr. H. L. 
Aldrich, Mr. Ernest Marshall, Mr. Charles Book, Mr. H. G. Lord, Mr. H. Davray. 

Lord Burnham read the following letter he had received from the Prime 
Minister: 

20 




LORD BURNHAM 



Harry Laioson Webster Lairson. Lord Burnham, second Baron, 
is the son of first Baron Burnham, and was born in London in 
1SG2. He was educated at Eton and Balliol College, Oxford. 
Lord Burnha/m is a member of Parliament, and oions an estate 
of some 5000 English acres. He is the proprietor of the London 
"Daily Telegraph" 



The Men of the Empire 

My Dear Burnhain: — I am sorry that I am unable to accept your kind invitation to 
the dinner you are giving to the influential body of American editors who are now in this 
country. I wish I could have been present to rejoice with you all in the victory for right 
and freedom to which the great Western democracy has so enormously contributed. 

May I also, on behalf of the Government and people of this country, pay my tribute 
of gratitude to the American Press for its handsome recognition of the share which these 
little islands and the British Empire as a whole have had in the burden of effort and sacri- 
fice which has led to this amazing triumph? 

Yours sincerely, 

D. Lloyd George. 

The toast of "The King and the President of the United States" was 
drunk with musical honours. 

England's Ordeal — 

Mr. Churchill proposed "The Newspaper Press of America." He said: 

I feel I am greatly honoured to have been invited to join in giving the guests who have 
come across the ocean in time of war from the United States a hearty welcome. I am told 
that a number of those who are here were cut off from all effective communication with 
the mainland during some of the most momentous days which have passed in the whole 
history of the world. They left the United States with the feeling that a long task might 
well lie before them; that they would come to a scene of intense carnage and destruction. 
They arrived to find that the work had been achieved, and that peace — or, at any rate, 
a solemn and justifiable hope of a lasting peace — had been established throughout Europe. 
I wondered whether those who have come all this distance across the ocean on a mission of 
high public importance have formed a favourable or unfavourable impression of the way 
in which the British public is comporting itself in this hour. We are entirely free at this 
moment from self-consciousness. We have been through too much. This long ordeal has 
worn us down to the very last ounce of buoyancy and spirit which a population and its 
Government can show. 

For nearly four and a half long years we have heard in our minds, and sometimes 
audibly, the dull rolling of the cannon in France and Flanders. We have known, day after 
day and night after night, that this ferocious military machine of war which the Germans 
had prepared over the lifetime of two complete generations was licking up our cherished 
and most beloved friends' children, brothers — and that at any moment some fatal message 
might come carrying grief to our own homes. And we have had wave after wave of effort 
and enthusiasm, as hope has been succeeded by disappointment, as fears have given place 
to the possibility of a further and a higher effort. We have had during all this time a 
continued diminution of our strength. But triumph has come in a fulness which no one 
could ever have thought possible. (Cheers.) Every word spoken in the excitement of the 
conflict has been made good in the terms of the treaty of capitulation — (cheers) — and with 
this came the rejoicing power of the British people after the long and horrible ordeal through 
which we have gone. (Cheers.) Therefore, I say I trust that you will bear this in mind 
when you come from the mighty nation across the ocean to the shattered communities in 
Europe, that the load and the burden of these days will not lift from us, even in our mo- 
ments of intense rejoicing, but will lie upon us heavily as the years roll by. 

21 



American Journalists in Europe 

Power of Hope — 

Nothing would have enabled the Old World to go on with this struggle against those 
hordes of a long-calculated conspiracy and tyranny which was nursed in Prussia but the 
fact that the fire of hope was always kept burning in our hearts. It is extraordinary in this 
the greatest of all the material struggles of the world, how the moral and the mental have 
decided the issue in the end. (Hear, hear.) Take the intervention of the United States. 
I have no hesitation in saying, speaking as an Englishman, though half an American — 
(laughter and cheers) — that the entrance of the United States into the war was the greatest 
mental effort and spiritual realization of truth which has occurred in the whole course of 
secular history. (Cheers.) We saw Europe precipitated into Asia by the Crusade. But 
compare that with the intense realization which has drawn more than 2,000,000 soldiers 
across the vast Atlantic to suffer and die on the field of France. We offer to you to-night 
our most respectful tribute of admiration for the great, the brilliant, achievement on the 
field of war which those American troops have performed. (Cheers.) It was a long and 
sombre struggle before the result was achieved; but there came the swift advance which 
carried them with victory to the very historic spot where France was stricken down in 
1870. Could there be any more poetically perfect way in which America could have paid 
her debt to France? (Cheers.) But greater and more decisive than all the physical and 
material contribution of the United States in this struggle has been its effect upon the 
mentality of the other Allied Powers engaged in the struggle. (Cheers.) 

No one can go on fighting without a continuous and fresh-recurring hope. You have 
seen what happened to the Germans when hope failed. Their front was unbroken. Their 
military reserves were still struggling to exact the sacrifice of millions of men in life and 
limb before they could be conquered. But hope went from them. No further prospect, 
no new circumstance presented itself to them to give them the expectation and the hope 
of escape from their situation. It was the message from across the Atlantic which, more 
than any other element in this struggle, more even than the heroic fighting of our men 
regardless of sacrifice, burnt hope into every breast in France and Britain and Italy. 
(Cheers.) Once the United States had hurled her mighty weight into the struggle, there 
could be no doubt about the ultimate result. (Cheers.) We have lost in this war what we 
can never hope to recover. You had begun to lose your dearest sons very heavily in the 
closing months of the struggle, and you will find your manhood scarred during the rest 
of your lives by the cruel injuries of the conflict. We have all lost in wealth, in happiness, 
in friends, in vital strength and energy. 

Our Gain — 

What have we gained? We have all gained the feeling that if such a great cause had 
to be fought out in the world, had to be fought out by these methods, it was a good thing 
that we lived to bear our share and part in that aim. (Hear, hear.) We have gained 
that — everyone has gained that. But in Great Britain and the United States there is an 
extra gain which Providence has bestowed upon us in this war. We have come together, 
and we never could have come together in ordinary days of peace. When we look back 
on our past history and see how the impression of old quarrels was necessarily fortified 
and developed by the teaching of each succeeding generation, we see that the gulf must 
have widened as the years and the centuries passed by. But this great struggle, this 
common cause, which enables us for the future to write our history together, has brought 

22 




WINSTON CHURCHILL 



Member of Parliament for Dundee, Scotland, is a brilliant man 
who has occupied many parliamentary positions, and is at pres- 
ent Secretary of State for War of the British Empire. One of 
his greatest acts, when First Lord of the Admiralty, roas in 
ordering the mobilization of the British Navy, in intelligent an- 
ticipation of possible trouble icith the Central Powers. He is one 
of the youngest members of the British Cabinet, and held the 
post of Minister of Munitions until after the armistice was 
signed, when he was appointed to his present cabinet rank 



The Men of the Empire 

us into an association — I care not whether it is association or alliance — into a comradeship 
begun in the consciousness of a common cause, pursued in faith to a high and an unchange- 
able ideal, and now flowing forward smoothly and swiftly in a genuine purpose of world- 
wide welfare, which will enable the British and the American peoples to act together in the 
closest harmony and sympathy. (Cheers.) The Press has played an extraordinary part 
in this war, at the outset rigorously excluded from even a public show of the military opera- 
tions, but afterwards taking charge of the whole front. (Laughter.) It is not possible to 
fight a great war like this except with a highly-intelligent democracy, and it is not possible 
to act upon the consciousness of a highly-intelligent democracy, except through the agency 
of a gigantic and innumerable Press. We have owed to the Press of this country a good 
many harsh criticisms and a good many rough turns, but in the main it has been the great 
vehicle which has expressed the national will, and it has been an indispensable element, 
I doubt not, in that marshalling of American strength which has enabled us to strike this 
decisive blow in the great struggle. (Cheers.) 

A Prophecy and an Epitaph 

Mr. A. J. Baldwin, Vice-President McCraw-Hill Co., New York, replied to the toast, 
referring to what was in the heart of the German Emperor, to the words he spoke, and to 
what he had done. He quoted a remarkable prophecy by Mr. Harold Frederick, which 
appeared in the New York Times after the coronation of the Emperor in April, 1888. The 
Kaiser was there spoken of as "utterly cold, entirely selfish, wantonly cruel, a young man 
without a conscience or any softening virtues whatever. It seems very probable that 
some future Taine, a century hence perhaps, will write to say that William II of Prussia 
was a mysterious belated survival of the mediaeval Goths and Vandals — an Attila, belated 
a thousand or more years after his time." The epitaph he (the speaker) would write of 
the Kaiser was: 

"The only German soldier who never fired a gun, 

The only German father who never lost a son, 

He called himself the God of War, but he never faced a fight, 

And when he crawled beneath the sod, the world just yelled 'Good-night.' ' (Cheers.) 

Beferring to the entry of Great Britain into the war, the speaker said from the moment 
she took that decision the heart of America was with her. (Cheers.) Americans had the 
same blood as England, the same common faith and heritage, and they had read that if a 
man should lose his life he would gain it, and if he should save his life he would lose it. If 
that was true of individuals, was it not true of nations? They had all been lifted out of 
themselves to a higher spiritual level. He thought this war would bring them greater 
patriotism, a world patriotism, and that was what they gained. (Cheers.) 

Mr. S. 0. Dunn, Editor of the Railway Age: 

I arise with a sense of complete inability to express what is in my mind and in my heart. 

Our party arrived at Liverpool only last Eriday — but four days ago. We had been 
on the sea thirteen days. During that time we were out of touch with all the news of the 
world — a time during which there was more important news to be in touch with than there 
ever was before in any equal period in the history of mankind. After we reached Liver- 
pool, we began to learn that the map of the world had been changed since we left New 
York. \\ e learned that Turkey had surrendered. We learned that Austria had collapsed, 
and that the Italians had captured 500,000 Austrian soldiers. In due course— 1 ! think it 
was some twenty-four hours after we landed — somebody confided to us that the Americans 

23 



American Journalists in Europe 

had made a great drive and taken Sedan. We learned that Germany was being torn by 
Bolshevik uprising, and that the end of the war, which we thought far off when we left 
America, was almost at hand. 

Well, you can imagine what sensations we have had, with all this news crashing in 
upon us at once. And then, since we arrived in Britain, of what a wonderful outpouring of 
hospitality we have been the recipients. And since the signing of the armistice, what a 
wonderful outburst of popular rejoicing we have witnessed. The world has been taught 
to believe that the British take their pleasures sadly. We have seen no evidence that 
they have taken sadly the pleasure afforded by the ending and the outcome of this war. 

With all the tremendous news of the last two weeks bursting upon us at once, and still 
fresh in our minds; with the evidences of your generous and abounding hospitality all 
about us ; with this wonderful celebration of the great victory still going on in your streets, 
need I say we all have sensations which no language could express? 

There is no feature of the outcome of this war which gives every true American so 
much satisfaction as the fact that America had some part in bringing this outcome about. 
As for myself, personally, there was never a moment from the time the mobilization began 
in Europe when I was not anti-German and pro-Ally. I had many reasons for assuming 
this attitude, but I shall mention only two. One of these was that I was in France and 
England in July, 1914. The other was that I was in Germany in June, 1914. The super- 
ciliousness, the egotism, the arrogance of the higher classes of Germany, their bumptious 
confidence in their "invincible arms" and in the superiority of their institutions, their 
outspoken contempt for the "decadent" nations around them, and especially for the 
French and the English, had become so marked and so disgusting by that time that I 
cannot comprehend how any intelligent and red-blooded American could have travelled 
in Germany then without coming away with a profound distrust for and dislike of the 
German government and the German higher classes. 

Now, it is well known that in the early stages of the struggle in Europe there were 
many of our people who were not pro-Ally, but who were pro-German. The number who 
were pro-German has been exaggerated, but that many were, is certain. The French, 
the British and the Italians felt that they were fighting our battles as well as their own, 
and they wondered why we did not come in. Well, you must remember that the United 
States has the most cosmopolitan population in the world. Furthermore, we have been 
a peace-loving nation and we have had certain traditions regarding the avoidance of en- 
tangling alliances which have exercised a powerful influence upon our public sentiment. 
Therefore, while there were many of us who thought almost from the start that we ought 
to get into the war, there were many others who were very slow to be convinced that we 
ought to get into it. Of one thing you may rest assured, however. This is that there 
never was a time when the sympathies of an overwhelming majority of our people were 
not on the side of the Allies. Furthermore, when we did come in, we came as a united 
people. Never in the history of America was there any subject upon which our people 
were more unanimously agreed than they were when they entered this war as to their 
duty to enter it and to spare no effort and no sacrifice to help to win it. Many of us 
think we were too slow about getting in; thank God, when we finally did get in, we were 
not too late. 

I hope I need not tell you how the fortitude, the courage, the indomitable will, the 
ability and adaptability that the British people have shown in the struggle have won the 
admiration of America. The attitude assumed by your great General, Sir Douglas Haig, 

24 




DAVID LLOYD GEORGE 



Member of Parliament for Carnarvon. Wales, and became 
Prime Minister in December, 1916, at the most critical period in 
the great war. He immediately formed a coalition Government 
representing all phases of British political thought. He is a 
self-math man. with intense human sympathies and magnetic 
personality which have carried him through many difficult 
periods of his great career. He has done more to awaken the 
national economic life of the British Empire ilian any other man 
of any period of Us history, anil his influence in international 
affairs has bttn dominant in forming the great alliance among 
the 'ii Hissed nations 



The Men of the Empire 

has especially impressed and moved some of us. Unity in the command of the Allied 
armies became absolutely necessary to their success. The spirit of loyalty and unselfish- 
ness with which Sir Douglas Haig subordinated himself to Marshal Foch was one of the 
best evidences he could have given that he was as great as a man and patriot as he was as 
a soldier. 

America came into the war late. Our direct contribution in the active fighting was 
comparatively modest. Our greatest contribution was that our entrance took the heart 
out of the Germans and put heart into the Allies. But while we came in late, we came 
prepared to stay long. I assure you, and my colleagues in our party will support the 
assurance, that when we left the United States, there was but one sentiment among our 
people, and that was a sentiment in favor of spending every dollar, putting forth every 
effort, making every sacrifice and shedding every drop of blood that was necessary to win 
this war. Having come in, we were determined to show that we merited a place in the 
ranks beside our gallant brethren of Italy, France and Great Britain. 

In conclusion, permit me to express on behalf of our party, to the British people and 
especially to our gracious and generous host, Lord Burnham, how deeply we are touched 
by, and how heartily we appreciate, the hospitality which is being extended to us. 

America s Lay Energy — 

Lord Burnham said he proposed to give a toast that, so far as he knew, had not been 
drunk in this country, "The Health of the General Staff of the Civilian Forces of the United 
States," whose invaluable work had not been very different in importance or responsibility 
from that of the general staff of the military forces. The black coats had won for them- 
selves a fame and a credit on the civil side of this war not far behind that of the more 
shining glories of the khaki and the blue. (Hear, hear.) The Chief Censor was present, 
so he should not dare, even though the war be over, to give information to the "transient 
and embarrassed phantoms" of German revolution who flirted across the tragic stage of 
Central Europe; but the business men and financiers of America had made good all that 
we hoped and expected of American enterprise and energy. Moreover, figures after 
dinner — even the figures of the Ministry of Food — were rather indigestible. (Laughter.) 
But we knew that America organized her great supplies, even of the inevitable bacon, in 
the nick of time, to supply the deficiencies of Great Britain and the Allied countries. 
(Cheers.) This gathering was one of fraternal greeting to the American editors and press- 
men who were now in this country, and he should like to say that their visit in itself justi- 
fied the appointment of our first and, perhaps, last Minister of Information, to whom they 
cordially wished a complete recovery of health. (Hear, hear.) No time could ever be so 
vital to the future of the world. The Three Sisters of the Greek myth who span and twisted 
and cut the destinies of our poor humanity had never, in their three or four thousand years 
of history, been so busy as during the last four weeks of earthquake and combustion. 
Never was the old Greek faith in Nemesis, as they called her, "lame-footed and late-punish- 
ing," more wonderfully justified. (Hear, hear.) The foundations of our European civi- 
lization were being shaken as they never were before, not even in the day of the French 
Revolution, which the seers of that time thought was the end of the old world and the true 
beginning of modern history. We must look forward to the testing time that was on us all, 
and nothing would, he believed, so much tend to bring us safely into the haven of ordered 
liberty and equal justice as a broad alliance of purpose and sympathy between the news- 
papers and publications of the whole circle of English-speaking nations in the new world 

25 



American Journalists in Europe 

and the old, if there be any of the old world left. Broadly speaking, they not only used the 
same language, but they professed the same faith, and practiced the same mystery — the 
mystery of making up the people's minds for them. They wanted to explain, each to the 
other, the idiosyncrasies, the prejudices, perhaps also the fine points of national character 
and customs. They might make more of each other's strength, less of each other's 
weakness. 

Twisting the lion's tail was never a good game if the lion were really a lion — even a sea 
lion, if he has a tail — (laughter) — and not a jackass stuffed in a lion's skin. This war had 
shown that there was something of the old lion left. It would not now be thought, perhaps, 
so much as it had been on the other side, that we had come down to the last match in the 
tray — the match that never struck. We, too, might see that the real currency of America 
was not the silver or the paper of her dollars, but the fine gold of high resolve and magnifi- 
cent achievement. (Cheers.) So in this better understanding might we have the union 
of the English-speaking peoples, which was the real security of the coming time — the only 
League of Nations that would have the power, and especially the sea power, to enforce its 
will in the bewildering multitude of small states that must come out of the present condition 
of national and international life. 

A distinguished American who was his guest that evening remarked to a friend of his 
that we were "a funny people." The British had done the greatest things in the world, 
and they did not seem to take any interest in them. (Laughter.) He feared that was 
our peculiar brand of bunkum — with a touch of the pride of the Pharisees. We were 
properly proud of ourselves in this war, and we had found our trumpeters in American 
orators and the American Press. No man had ever praised the British Navy in more 
resonant and insistent words than Admiral Sims. (Cheers.) No man had ever praised 
the British Army more than Major Palmer, the American Press officer at the front. (Cheers.) 
America had its League of Friendship before the States founded their Federal Union. 
Theirs would be a League of Friendship only, but it would have at its base the words of 
Lincoln, "Let us have faith that Bight makes Might, and in that Faith let us to the end 
dare to do our duty as we understand it." (Cheers.) In associating the toast with the 
Hon. Oscar Crosby, the Sub-Treasurer of the United States, Lord Burnham recalled the 
common debt of America and England to Dr. Page, the late Ambassador. 

Still on Guard — 

The Hon. Oscar Crosby responded. The civil forces, he said, were not merely those 
that served the Government. There was a vast body of men who had given in private 
life all they could to the support of their Government. They had the double feeling, per- 
haps, that they would have been glad to do something for the Government more directly. 
Yet there had been a sense of conviction that in remaining in private life they were doing 
their maximum service for the cause. The task of the civil forces was not yet ended. 
They must be still on guard and joined to all the men in khaki who were only civilians. 
Those who remained in black coats must confront the problems that were now so insist- 
ently driven upon them. They believed they had driven the great enemies of the human 
race from the international arena. He thought the problems were more national than 
international, and that a radical rearrangement must be made if we were to have a durable 
peace. In the financial aid which America gave to the Entente the civil servants of the 
United States had been delighted to be able, earlier than their brothers in khaki, to bring 
some help to winning the war. (Cheers.) 



The Men of the Empire 

Sir F. E. Smith, K.C., M.P., proposing "The Health of Our Host," said Lord Burnham 
was a director of one of the greatest organs of the Press in this country. He did not know 
whether it would be possible to say that on every great issue which had called for public 
discussion The Daily Telegraph had been right or wrong, but this he did know, that there 
never had been any question on which the fortunes of England and the maintenance of a 
strong, patriotic, anti-defeatist Government depended which had not from the first to the 
last commanded the enthusiastic devotion of Lord Burnham and The Daily Telegraph. 
(Cheers.) When the first Coalition Government came into office Lord Burnham and his 
paper saw that, whatever its faults might be, it stood for England and the Empire and the 
Alliance, and never did he waver in his support of it. He remembered well some of the 
crises which perplexed them in those days, and he should be slow to claim that their deci- 
sions were always right, but until there was a Government which could replace it, it was 
the duty of the Press of this country to support it in an age in which everything was essen- 
tially dynamic and uncertain. (Hear, hear.) It was then that the Prime Minister, Mr. 
Asquith, who supported for many years a great burden, vindicated the honour of these 
islands when he uttered a sentence which would live as long as any sentence in the classical 
speeches of Thucydides, "We will never sheathe the sword, which we have not lightly 
drawn, until we have crushed Prussian militarism." (Cheers.) He was addressing men 
who were very familiar with what were commonly known as "stunts." It was much 
easier to oppose than to support, particularly when things were going badly ; and when the 
fortunes of the state seemed to be rocking in the balance and we had reached what might 
have seemed to be the darkest moments of the war, Lord Burnham never despaired of the 
Bepublic, never withheld his support from those upon whom the fortunes of the Bepublic 
depended. Our American friends had done us more than justice in their recognition of 
what England had done in this war. (Hear, hear.) Their President had stood amongst 
the Press the exemplar of a single-hearted spirit of patriotism. (Cheers.) 

Lord Burnham, responding, said he neither claimed nor desired to claim any more 
than to have done his best to uphold the traditions which had been handed down from the 
earliest days of our freedom. The British Press, in a sense, had no doubt given the lead — 
and perhaps set the standard — to the Press of the English-speaking countries, but it had 
learned much from the American Press, and it was their pride that in all the English- 
speaking countries the tradition established long ago had been maintained. (Cheers.) 
Nothing could be more magnificent than the unanimity and patriotism with which the 
American Press had supported what it believed to be the cause of freedom and justice. 
(Cheers ) 

Luncheon by Sir George Perley — 

November thirteenth our party was given a luncheon at the Savoy by 
Sir George Perley, High Commissioner for Canada. It was interesting to 
note the attitude of England to her great American colony, and to note the 
difference between a Country and an Empire. We felt quite at home with 
our Canadian neighbors. In the first place, they really spoke the English 
language, and their problems of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness 
are very similar to our own. We have crossed and recrossed the imaginary 
line separating us without knowing it, and as neighbors we have taken a 

27 



American Journalists in Europe 

mutual interest in affairs, and the trend of our industries has crossed and 
recrossed to mutual advantage. We had felt from the beginning a neigh- 
borly pride in the wonderful participation of Canada in the great war. 
One of Canada's sons, Mr. Dixon, employed in our own offices, had promptly 
answered the call of his country, and had written us many accounts of the 
activities of his men in the operation of machine guns. We were particu- 
larly proud of the fact that our host himself acknowledged with pride his 
nativity to the State of New Hampshire, and that led us to recollect that 
the Chairman of the English Railroad Board, formerly general manager 
of the Great Eastern Railway, was at a still earlier date manager of the 
railroad system of Long Island. This led us also to claim Lord Beaver- 
brook himself as a native American, and his great interest in American 
affairs and the relations between the English-speaking nations has given 
him a lasting relationship. 

In proposing the toast of "Our Guests," Sir George Perley said that 
until the armistice was signed there was no public statement on the subject, 
no premature rejoicing, and all the people here carried on just as if they 
expected the war to last some years longer. The result has shown that 
people who governed themselves were able to protect themselves. It had 
often been doubted by many whether democracies could really protect 
themselves against autocracy. Now, we knew that they could, and we had 
demonstrated that we had the proper system of government, and we hoped 
and believed that we might help the rest of the world to get these blessings 
as well. Sir George Perley referred to the close relationship which existed 
between Canada and the United States, and reminded his hearers of the 
great part the United Kingdom, and especially the British Navy, had 
played in the war. 

Mr. H. M. Swetland, responding, said that they were not here to pass 
the pleasantries of the hour. They were here to consider some of the 
greater things which must follow in the steps of this great war. Now that 
the sound of the cannon had passed beyond their hearing and they were 
not privileged, if it might have been a privilege, to be at the front during 
the fighting, it seemed to them, as Americans, that there were some great 
questions which must come before the English-speaking people — questions 
of reconstruction. Every way they looked and every way they turned 
they found that they were confronted with new conditions. The principles 
of democracy are permeating every form of government. By the people 
and for the people must be the basis of intelligent government, whether 
it be republic or monarchy in form. The welfare of all the people of a 
nation must have first consideration. Class legislation and eventually 

28 



The Men of the Empire 

politics must be replaced by pure regulations and progressive statesman- 
ship. Capital and labor must unite on a common constructive policy. 
The division of profits must cease to be the dominant contention. Increased 
production must have first consideration. Instead of curtailing its effi- 
ciency and penalizing production, labor must encourage industry and expect 
reward proportional to individual effort. Capital must take the intelligent 
worker into his confidence and give him a voice in the problem of produc- 
tion. Capital must be alert to recognize the intelligent progress of produc- 
tion, and keen to share increased profits with her partner. Civilization 
today demands less accumulation to capital and less poverty to labor, 
based, however, in either case on the integrity and intelligence of the pro- 
ductive effort. 

All these matters were going to need the most careful consideration 
of the best thinking men in the world. They had been invited here to do 
their part in this great reconstruction work. They would study the con- 
ditions carefully. They had great confidence in the future, and believed 
that when England and Canada and Australia and America joined hands 
they would reach the answer. 

Mr. F. G. Glass, proposing the health of Sir George Perley, said that 
they had seen the spirit of Great Britain under conditions that were most 
valuable in character. They would go back to America very heavy with 
their sense of appreciation and with their knowledge of the conditions of 
Europe. We were going to have trouble, of course, in future in handling 
the world problems. President Wilson, in his speech to Congress the day 
before, merely outlined some of the serious problems we English-speaking 
people would have to tackle. We had the greatest responsibility placed 
upon us today that we had ever had in the history of the world. There was 
to come the real test of our civilization to be able to assimilate the fruits 
of our victory for the benefit of the world in order that it should be a per- 
manent and a useful victory. 

Sir George Perley, in reply, said the League of Nations was something 
that we all hoped for, but if unfortunately it should not be brought about, 
it seemed to him that the alliance between the English-speaking people— 
the United States and the British Empire— ought to be quite enough to 
guard the peace of the world. 

American Chamber of Commerce — 

On our way to the Savoy we called at the office of the Chamber of 
Commerce in London. This organization is performing a great service 
to the world-wide business of all countries. Its plans for a combination 

29 



American Journalists in Europe 

and inter-relations with the important Chambers of Commerce of all im- 
portant countries of the world is attracting much attention, is well under 
way, and is capable of performing great service to the international business 
relations of the world. 

Drapers' 1 Organizer — 

Our party paid a visit to the offices of the "Drapers' Organizer." These 
people are important art printers, employ a large number of artists, and 
have recently been doing a tremendous amount of art printing for the 
Government. Their art work is of the very highest order. Their pub- 
lication is extremely artistic, and presents English textile products to 
foreign and domestic buyers in a very instructive and attractive manner, 
and we were much interested in comparing our own products and 
methods in this direction with this well-organized and highly specialized 
production. 

We met at the "Drapers' Organizer" Mr. Hobart Jackson, Editorial 
Director, and Mr. Theodore A. Stephens, Managing Director, who escorted 
us to luncheon at the Carlton Hotel, where we met a large number of dis- 
tinguished guests, among whom were: Right Hon. Winston Churchill, 
Minister of Munitions; Lord Desborough, Chairman of the London Cham- 
ber of Commerce; W. Joynson Hicks, M.P. ; William Wallace, Director, 
National Trade Press; General Sims, Roy Somerville, Chairman, National 
Trade Press; A. A. Martin, Director, National Trade Press; Sir Woodman 
Burbidge and John C. Curtiss. 

At this luncheon I was seated next to Mr. Churchill. We fell into a 
discussion of Wilson's idea of an international peace. Churchill said to me, 
and afterwards repeated in his speech: "There will be more wars. Each 
country has its interests. An international congress will split on grave 
problems, and the split will cause war." He advised a congress with power 
to know the secrets of every country and its war preparations, and put this 
forth as a great preventative. I urged that if the civilization of England 
could enforce peace between the colonies of the British Empire, an inter- 
national congress, backed by military police, could enforce peace between 
the nations. To this Churchill demurred and replied, "England will never 
give up her navy." 

Dinner by General Smuts — ■ 

The Right Hon. J. T. Smuts, Lieutenant-General of the British Army, 
also gave us a dinner of welcome. General Smuts began his career as a 
Boer soldier. He was one of the most successful leaders of the Boers in 

30 



The Men of the Empire 

that country's war with Great Britain, slightly more than twenty years 
ago, and provided a concrete instance of British success in harmonizing alien 
interests, and using them for the common good in times of stress. When 
the call came, General Smuts took complete charge of military affairs in 
South Africa. He raised and trained troops, mobilized all possible effec- 
tives, arranged for supplies and transportation, and conducted a most 
effective campaign throughout those portions of the African wilds which 
were under the German heel. The General was no less a born military 
leader than he afterwards proved himself to be a statesman. As soon as 
his military work was effectively accomplished, he went to London, where, 
as a member of the War Council, and in political meetings he aroused in- 
tense enthusiasm among a class which had apparently not hitherto fully 
realized that their country was not only at war but in dire peril. He now 
talks and fights like a staunch Englishman. 

Admiral Jellicoe, Arnold Bennett, Lord Islington and other distinguished 
gentlemen attended this dinner. 

In the course of a statesmanlike speech, General Smuts paid tribute to the 
beneficent regime which Britain has always endeavored to establish in 
her colonies and over conquered peoples. One could but contrast the atti- 
tude of those peoples who have been conquered by the Germans during 
the past four years. 

Mr. Parmelee, who is also a distant son of Holland, responded as 
follows: 

General Smuts and Friends: — It gives me sincere pleasure to say on behalf of the mem- 
bers of our party that we have listened with approval and admiration to the statesmanlike 
speech of our host. For my own part I acknowledge some surprise at hearing these re- 
marks from the lips of a soldier. We have been accustomed to think of soldiers as men of 
action who leave politics and state-craft to others; but the combination of these qualities 
in General Smuts explains his peculiar title as it appears on the menu card this evening. 
I could not help wondering why it should be "Lt.-General The Rt. Hon. J. T. Smuts," but 
it is now quite evident that the combination acknowledges his qualifications for state-craft 
as well as for military affairs. 

I greeted you simply as "friends" because I could think of no more appropriate or 
sincere word to explain the relationship which I think we all want to see between the Eng- 
lish and American people. You may have heard the definition of a friend as we have it 
across the water — "one who knows all about you and likes you just the same." That is 
what we hope to accomplish through a brief visit among you — to learn something about 
you and still like you. In the same way it is to be hoped that we may retain your friend- 
ship after you have discovered many of our little peculiarities. 

I sometimes think it is unfortunate that the only idea of an Englishman that many 
Americans ever get is from the exaggerated type which appears on our stage. As depicted 
in our dramas and comedies, an Englishman is usually an insufferable snob, wearing a 
monocle and speaking with a broad accent. This impression is probably so widespread 

31 



American Journalists in Europe 

that I think many Americans would be surprised not to find the type prevalent in London. 
We have not seen them and if you really have any of them you probably are keeping them 
in seclusion. 

It was a great pleasure to me during dinner to discover that our host, General Smuts, 
and myself are distant relatives. It seems likely that 200 years ago our forefathers, or 
mothers, chatted together over the back fence. At that time Holland was the center of 
culture in Europe and our recently defeated enemies were the same barbarians they are 
today without the veneer of civilization. For various reasons our respective forefathers 
saw fit to emigrate from Holland and probably left about the same time — his going to 
South Africa and mine to New Amsterdam or what is now New York. Since that time 
the Boers of South Africa and the people of the American colonies have had their differences 
with the English people but those differences are so completely adjusted today that we find 
General Smuts in the military service of the country by which his people were vanquished 
in battle, while Americans have been proud to serve with English forces against a 
common enemy. 

I am sure that the prospect of continued harmony among the English-speaking people 
is greatly enhanced by such simple functions as we are enjoying this evening. It is difficult 
to quarrel with those whom we know well and for whom we have respect. The war has 
inevitably increased the mutual respect of the American and English people and I am sure 
that with the special efforts that will be made by both nations there is little prospect that 
we shall again become estranged. The time has arrived when the English-speaking people 
are to direct the affairs of the world. This is not because we sought it but because we could 
not approve of the methods adopted by whose who tried to impose upon us Teutonic 
ideals. Having set these aside the very definite duty devolves upon us to see that we 
take constructive measures to make the world a decent place in which to live. 

Call on Lord Northcliffe — 

On the morning of the fifteenth, our party made a formal call at the 
home of Lord Northcliffe. He received us in his library in a businesslike 
manner, and asked us at once whom we wished to meet in England. We 
said that we wished to meet those interested in the industrial development 
of the Empire. He replied: "I will arrange that upon your return from 
Scotland." 

American Chamber of Commerce — 

Our meeting was brief, and we hastened away to a luncheon given by the 
American Chamber of Commerce. General Sims, of the British Army, 
presided, and Admiral Sims, of the American Navy, made the principal 
address. He described the importance of the Navy in the war; showed 
conclusively that the control of the seas was the dominating factor of suc- 
cess. He spoke of the harmony of action between the British and American 
officers, and told how the American Fleet was placed at the disposal of the 
British. He dwelt on the importance of international acquaintance, and the 

32 



The Men of the Empire 

necessity of knowing the personal characteristics of our people, and illus- 
trated his point hy one of his famous stories: "A Frenchman enters a car, 
hows to the people on the right and on the left, and apologizes for his inter- 
ruption. When he leaves the car he again hows right and left, and leaves 
with an implied apology. An Englishman enters a car, sees no one, and 
seats himself with an atmosphere of ownership. An American enters a car, 
sees everybody, bows to no one, and when he sits down you know he does 
not care a damn who owns the car!" 

City of Edinburgh — 

The most formal receptions that we attended were those in Scotland. 
The Lord Provost of Edinburgh and the City Directors entertained us at 
dinner in the City Chambers. The city buildings contain not only the 
council chambers, libraries, art gallery and museums, but great reception 
rooms and banquet halls. We were conducted to the anteroom, where 
our wraps were removed, and then were ushered into the presence of the 
Lord Provost and the City Directors. 

It was somewhat disconcerting to have our names announced in sten- 
torian tones by a uniformed attendant as we entered, and to be confronted 
with a line of the Directors, headed by the Lord Provost, all decorated in 
the regalia of their respective offices. Each had a necklace of gold and 
jewelled medallions, ending at the bottom with a large medallion repre- 
senting the insignia of his particular office. The Lord Provost extended 
his hand to welcome us, and we went down the line. At the end, we found 
ourselves lined up on the opposite side of the room facing our hosts like a 
military review. Resolved to break the ice, I walked across to the line 
of dignitaries, boldly reached for the emblazoned medallion and asked for 
an explanation of the meaning of the decoration. This was given to me 
in such broad Scotch that its meaning is still an unanswered enigma, 
although the cordiality with which it was given assured me that it was 
all right. 

After a few minutes of attempted conversation, the stentorian voice 
came to my rescue and announced dinner. We marched down past the 
fifteen or twenty City Fathers into the banquet hall, two by two, each of 
the guests accompanied by one of the officials. I found my neighbor at 
my left at the table to be an important Scotchman, the publisher of The 
Scotsman, the great daily of Edinburgh. He kindly wrote his name on 
the back of my menu, but inasmuch as his writing was as broad as his 
dialect, it was of no great assistance to my memory. The dinner was 
conducted in great state and formality. We were served with the famous 

33 



American Journalists in Europe 

Scotch Haggis. The Lord Provost, Sir J. Lome MacLeod, presided. 
Among those present were: 

Lord Scott Dickson, Brigadier-General Sir Robert Cranston, Colonel Sir Robert 
Moncrieffe, Colonel Blair, the Rev. Dr. Wallace Williamson, Mr. James Law, Mr. James 
P. Croal, Mr. A. Darling, Master of the Edinburgh Merchant Company; Major Hule, 
Chairman of Edinburgh Paris Council; Provost Lindsay, Leith; Mr. Gordon Douglas, Mr. 
Robert Wilson, and Mr. Rufus Fleming. American Consul. The guests included Messrs. 
Ernest Harlin Abbott, The Outlook, New York; Jackson Fleming, Christian Advocate, New 
York; Dan Drearlet Brummitt, Epworlh Herald, Chicago; R. W. Gammon, Congregational- 
ist and Advance, Chicago; Clifton Doggett Grey, The Baptist Standard, Chicago; William 
Revell Moody, The Record of Christian World, East Northfield, Mass. ; Wil'iam Douglas 
MacKenzie, President, Hartford Theological Seminary; Philip Howard, Sunday School 
Times, Philadelphia; Charles Clayton Morrison, Christian Century, Chicago; Guy Emery 
Skippler, The Churchman, New Jersey; H. L. Aldrich, Editor Marine Engineering: Roger 
W. Allen, Editor, The American Halter; David Beecroft, Editor, Automotive Industries; 
A. W. Clark, Editor, American Paint and Oil Dealer; Frederick F. Cutler, Editor, Shoe and 
Leather Reporter; E. H. Darville, Editor, Hardware Age; H. Cole Estep, Editor, Iron Trade 
Review; Samuel 0. Dunn. Editor, Railway Age; H. G. Lord, Editor, Textile World Journal; 
W. W. Macon, Editor, The Iron Age; H. C. Parmelee, Editor, Chemical and Metallurgical 
Engineering; Floyd W. Parson, Editor, Coal Age; H. M. Swetland, President, United 
Publishers' Corporation; H. E. Taylor, Editor, Dry Goods Economist; Arthur J. Baldwin, 
President, Associated Business Papers. 

The Lord Provost, in proposing the toast of "The Guests," said Amer- 
ica's entry into the war came to their people as a great moral approbation 
of this country's policy. It filled them with great joy and sustained their 
courage, resolution and endurance to an extent which was hardly calculable. 
America's contribution towards the happy result of last week, in men, 
money, foodstuffs and material, they deeply acknowledged ; it was undoubt- 
edly the determining factor in the situation. They welcomed that and every 
opportunity of exchanging views and sentiments with the delegations from 
America. They desired to come into closer understanding and cooperation 
because they believed that the association of the two English-speaking 
peoples was necessary for the safety and the preservation of the liberties 
of the world. 

Mr. Beecroft, replying on behalf of the business group, said that while 
Edinburgh did not rank as a manufacturing center, it had always been 
highly appreciated and recognized throughout America as one of the great 
educational centers of the British Isles, and connected as they were with 
the various industries the delegation did not fail to recognize that educa- 
tion stood as the basis of industry. This war had been called a war of 
smokestacks and machinery, and as industry had played a wonderful part 
in the war, so would industry continue to play a still greater part in the 

34 



The Men of the Empire 

reconstruction programme that had already been entered upon. The 
belligerent stage of the war had taught them the one great lesson of co- 
operation and concentration, and now that they had passed that stage 
Britain and America must work together as fellow-nations in the problems 
concerning humanity that lay before them. They felt that they were on 
the threshold of a new epoch, and that upon this generation rested the bur- 
den of so framing and fashioning the principles that were going to govern 
this epoch, that honesty in business and international honesty in business 
would never be questioned. A new power had come into this great Empire 
because of what women had done since 1914. Britain was ahead of them 
in that regard. Following the signing of peace their fondest wish was that 
there would be an ever-increasing business relation between the two great 
Anglo-Saxon nations. 

Mr. Abbott, New York, who responded for the other group, said there 
was a report that the President of the United States was considering a visit 
to this land. Whether he came or not he was sure that all those who came 
from America would agree that if their King should go to their land, he 
would be royally welcomed. America was not a Bepublic; it was a Con- 
sular Bepublic, and the President was not merely a political leader, the 
head of a Government, but the symbol of a nationality. Scotsmen who 
had gone from this land to America had contributed to its character some 
of those qualities which they liked to think were among the greatest. The 
Lord Provost had been generous beyond their expression of appreciation 
in his estimate of what America had done in the war. They knew perfectly 
well that Great Britain would never have been defeated. America's com- 
ing into the war did not avert defeat. It might have hastened victory. 
Great Britain did not need saving, for they had saved their own souls when 
they entered the war in August, 1914. America came in because they 
needed the same kind of salvation, and knew that it could be won in no 
other way, for the soul of Britain and America consisted of their faith in 
liberty and law. Although despotism was the enemy of that ideal, the 
opposite extreme, anarchy, was likewise an enemy, and in the days to 
come America and Britain were going to face together the common prob- 
lems that confronted them. 

The toast of "The Lord Provost" was proposed by Mr. Arthur J. Bald- 
win, in the course of which he said: — 

"No one person could precipitate our country into war, and even if such power were 
possible, we would be of little service unless the people of our country were stirred to 
demand such procedure. It required some time to awaken the whole country to a realiza- 
tion of the necessities and to get away from the long-standing principle that each continent 

35 



American Journalists in Europe 

should regulate its own difficulties. But when we did start we placed our full support, 
believing in the movement, and at the close America's full force was with the Allies." 

We joined as best we could in singing "God Save the King," and then 
we asked permission of the Lord Provost for our party to sing the words of 
"America" to the same tune. The last trace of stiffness disappeared from 
the gathering as our voices mingled in the common anthem, "Auld Lang 
Syne." The picture as we stood around this festive table, with our hands 
crossed, grasping with our right hand the hand of our neighbor on the left, 
and with an up and down movement keeping time to this great historic 
melody, will always remain vivid in our memory. 

City of Glasgow — 

The dinner given by the Lord Provost of Glasgow was almost a dupli- 
cation of the stately scenes which we had witnessed in Edinburgh. Our 
host was still more Scotch on this occasion, and after a wonderful display 
of oratory in the Scotch dialect, he ended with the statement that as we 
were all of English descent we spoke the same language. In these Scotch 
cities leading citizens are members of the city government. There are no 
political parties, and the city's business is conducted as a great business 
corporation. Glasgow is one of the most progressive cities in municipal 
control of public utilities, operating its own gas, lighting and water works 
and street railways. It also owns many blocks of municipal dwellings for 
workingmen which are leased at very moderate rental, which tends to keep 
the rents of private owned tenements at a reasonable price. Glasgow's 
growth in the past ten years and particularly since the war has been very 
rapid. It has now a population considerably exceeding a million, and is 
the second city in the British Isles. 

Mr. H. L. Aldrich made the response for our party as follows: 

Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen: It is with much pleasure that I make this, my first 
appearance in Scotland, for most of my ancestors came from this country. The original 
ancestor left Scotland in 1636, and many members of the family since this original ancestor 
were of Scotch birth or descent. Probably nothing that I can say to you will interest you 
so much as to give you a little idea of what we are doing in America in shipbuilding. Before 
the war, a shipyard that had eight or ten launching ways was regarded as a yard of very 
large size. We had a few such yards, but they were not kept very busy, owing to the fact 
that shipbuilding was not a great industry with us. 

Soon after the Huns started in with their submarine campaign, it was evident that 
there would be a great demand for vessels, and this demand was made very urgent in a 
speech by Mr. Lloyd George, in which he referred to the great necessity for "ships and 
ships and still more ships." To supply the necessary shipbuilding facilities called for, the 
United States Government established several shipyards, two of which are so large that a 

36 



The Men of the Empire 

little information regarding them will interest you. It was absolutely necessary to estab- 
lish these new yards because the existing yards were filled up with all the work for the 
United States Navy, in building battleships, cruisers and especially destroyers, that they 
could possibly build. 

The largest yard established by the United States Government is referred to as the 
Hog Island Shipyard. This is on the Delaware River, just below Philadelphia. It extends 
for over a mile and a quarter on the west bank of the river, just below where the Schuylkill 
enters the Delaware. Along this expanse of over a mile and a quarter are fifty launching 
ways, a very remarkable sight when seen from the deck of a steamer in the river. 

This yard is divided up into ten distinct shipyards, each with five launching ways. 
Orders have been placed in this shipyard by the Emergency Fleet Corporation, a branch 
of the United States Shipping Board, to build 110 ships, each of 7,500 tons D. W., and 
seventy ships of 8,000 tons D. W. Included in the latter are a number of fifteen-knot 
troopships so-called. When our troops are all returned from France, these troopships will 
probably be changed over into passenger vessels to sail the seven seas. 

The next largest shipyard is the one established by the Submarine Boat Co. in the 
Newark Meadows, about ten miles from the center of New York City. In this yard are 
twenty-five launching ways. The company has a contract for about 140 vessels, each of 
5,500 tons D. W., but in order to be prepared for future business, the launching ways were 
built large enough and substantially enough to accommodate vessels of about 8,000 tons. 

The type of vessel being built in this yard, as stated, is 5,500 tons dead weight. Each 
of these vessels calls for the driving of about 425,000 rivets. About twenty-five per cent 
of these rivets are driven in the fabricating shops, where much of the framework and plat- 
ing is fabricated. Each ship is 335 feet, 6 inches over all, 46 feet beam, 22 feet, 11 inches 
load draft, and has 1,500 horsepower. The propelling machinery consists of turbine reduc- 
tion gears, and propellers make about ninety revolutions per minute. The estimated 
speed is ten and one-half knots. 

As a matter of fact, neither the Hog Island Shipyard nor the Submarine Boat Shipyard 
can be spoken of as a shipyard in the full sense of the term. They are not shipyards; 
they are simply assembling yards, as a greater part of the material going into these ships 
is fabricated in other shops. This is well illustrated by the fact that ninety-six per cent 
of the material used in the 5,500-ton ships building at the yard of the Submarine Boat 
Company is fabricated in outside shops. These shops include twenty-eight steel mills 
and fifty-six other shops of various kinds, in which the fabricating is done. 

When I left New York, the General Manager of the Submarine Boat Yard told me 
that he was turning out about six ships a month, and he was hoping a little later to be able 
to deliver to the Emergency Fleet Corporation twelve completed ships a month. The 
description of these two yards will show how different business is in America from what it 
is as a general rule in your shipyards. Today we had the pleasure of spending several hours 
in the yard of Sir William Bcardmore. Just think of the money that a concern of this kind 
must be making, when it is considered that there is a profit at every stage in the operation 
of furnishing and fabricating material. This company mines its own ore in its own mines 
— one profit. It carries its own ore in its own vessels and delivers it at the steel mills in 
Great Britain — another profit. It makes its own castings, plates and shapes — another 
profit, and so 1 might go on, naming the different stages through which the iron and steel 
pass in building hulls, boilers, engines, both reciprocating and turbine, and other parts 
of ships. Just think of the great amount of profit a concern like this can make. 

37 



American Journalists in Europe 

In America we specialize so closely that in many of our shipyards not even the deck and 
engine room auxiliaries are built. Whether one system is better than the other is fortu- 
nately a subject upon which I do not have to pass. Great Britain has been a maritime 
nation for many centuries, and will undoubtedly continue to be a maritime nation, and in 
spite of all the vessels that we are building, I do not imagine that you are worried very 
greatly over the possibility of being driven from the sea. I can imagine that we in America 
may perhaps build cargo steamers cheaper than you can build them here, and it may be 
that we will become the great nation to build cargo vessels, as they can be manufactured 
on a large scale rather than to be built individually. The passenger vessels are different 
propositions. They require individual attention, and I do not suppose there is much doubt 
but that Great Britain will continue to be the great place where passenger vessels will be 
built for years to come. 

I thank you. 

Craioford Dinner — 

On the evening of the twenty-third we were back in London, and attend- 
ed a dinner given by Mr. W. S. Crawford. It was an opportunity which 
brought together a large number of publishers and advertisers. Mr. Craw- 
ford is particularly interested in advertising, and has done much to promote 
the business interests which he serves in this direction. The specially 
invited guests were General Townshend, Sir Thomas Lipton and Admiral 
Sims. We were again served the famous Haggis and a snifter of Scotch 
and various other things to the content of our most exacting epicure. The 
advantage of cooperation between publisher and advertiser was fully dis- 
cussed in the welcome given by Mr. Crawford, and the power of practical 
advertising was presented in a forceful manner, with many instances given 
from personal experience. Sir Thomas Lipton did not need to endorse the 
advertising sentiment, for we had already observed "Lipton's Tea" in 
elaborate display in all forms of advertising. Admiral Sims acknowledged 
the power of the press, spoke of the assistance rendered on many occasions 
both in creating sound public sentiment and in correcting wrong impressions, 
and concluded with his famous pie story which has been given much pub- 
licity in the English press. 

Sir Thomas J. Lipton — 

The twenty-fourth was made memorable by a visit to the home of Sir 
Thomas Lipton, who had invited us to come to luncheon and to stay for tea. 
His home is filled with curios collected from all over the world, and his 
mind is a reservoir of incidents, beginning with his arrival at Castle Garden 
as an immigrant, to his present acquaintance with kings and queens of all 
nations. The simplicity of his manner lent charm to his hospitality. His 
sportsmanship is well known. His eye is still on the yacht cup which he is 

38 







PRINTING HOUSE SQUARE 50 YEARS AGO 




PRINTING HOUSE SQUARE PRESENT DAT 



The Men of the Empire 

about to challenge. He is particularly proud of his Ceylon tea, and a great 
producer of it as well. His merchant ships were turned over to the hospital 
service of his country when the war began, and he, personally, superintended 
this work. He lives in one of the finest houses in the suburbs of London, 
and has a retinue of Chinese servants dressed in their native costume 
and wearing a wonderful comb, which surrounds the head at the top 
under the queue. He presented us with a shamrock pin and a silk handker- 
chief beautifully embroidered, and promised us a package of his famous 
tea when we arrived in New York. He is a bachelor of about seventy, hale 
and hearty, and his genuine humor and kind invitation to come again were 
much appreciated. 



Luncheon at The Times with Lord Northcliffe — 

Pursuant to his promise that our party should meet the great industrial 
leaders of the Empire, Viscount Northcliffe honored us with a luncheon in 
The Times office at Printing House Square, on November twenty-ninth. 
We were on historic ground. The site of the buildings was occupied as a 
large and important monastery in the thirteenth century. It was occupied 
by King Edward II in the fourteenth century, and Parliament was here 
assembled. In the fifteenth century the monastery was occupied by the 
Emperor Charles V, and later by Henry VIII, who held here the "Black 
Parliament." After the monastery was abandoned by the Black Friars, 
the region was devastated by the great fire of 1666, and a year later there 
was built on this spot the King's Printing House, from which Printing 
House Square takes its name. In 1770 the King's Printers of the time 
moved to another place of business. In 1784 it was taken by the first of a 
family that has ever since been identified with the spot, John Walter, the 
founder of The Times. The buildings have since been enlarged and re- 
constructed, notably in 1874, and now occupy the whole square. It is a 
strange fact that the man who founded The Times was neither a journalist 
nor a printer. About 1783, John Walter, who had been first a coal mer- 
chant, then an underwriter of shipping, bought the patent rights of a method 
of printing by means of "logotypes" or fount composed of whole words in- 
stead of separate letters. He improved the device and set up as a printer 
in Printing House Square. On January 1, 1785, he started a little news- 
paper called The Daily Universal Register, and on January 1, 1788, the name 
was changed to The Times. Thus began the career of this great newspaper. 
John Walter II became manager of the paper in 1803, and remained in con- 
trol until his death in 1847. He aimed to keep The Times independent of 

39 



American Journalists in Europe 

governments or parties, and of his own contributors and advertisers, and in 
his day the paper achieved its reputation of being no party organ. In 
1847, John Walter III succeeded to the management of the paper, and at 
his death in 1894 his son, Arthur Fraser Walter, became chief proprietor. 
John Walter IV is now Chairman of the Board of Directors of the paper 
which was founded by his great-great grandfather. In 1908 Lord North- 
cliffe became the principal shareholder in a newly formed company owning 
the property. The Times has always been quick to take up great national 
movements in times of stress, notably The Times Red Cross Fund, which 
raised during the war more than $55,000,000 for the sick and wounded 
soldiers of the allied countries. 

The following is a report of the meeting as published in The Times: 

The American trade editors who are in England on a visit to the Allied 
countries were the guests of Lord Northcliffe at luncheon yesterday at 
Printing House Square. The visitors, who have been in this country for 
several weeks, have inspected many of the leading British industrial con- 
cerns and have seen something of the extent of the war effort of our manu- 
facturers and work people. 

The following is a full list of the company: — 

American trade editors: Mr. H. M. Swetland, President, United Publishers' Corpora- 
tion; Mr. D. Beecroft, Automotive Industries; Mr. H. L. Aldrich, Marine Engineering; 
Mr. B. W. Allen, The American Hatter; Mr. A. W. Clark, American Paint and Oil Dealer; 
Mr. F. F. Cutler, Shoe and Leather Reporter; Mr. E. H. Darville, Hardware Age; Mr. S. O. 
Dunn, Railway Age; Mr. H. Cole Estep, Iron Trade Review; Mr. H. G. Lord, Textile World 
Journal; Mr. W. W. Macon, The Iron Age; Mr. H. C. Parmelee, Chemical and Metallurgi- 
cal Engineering; Mr. H. E. Taylor, Dry Goods Economist. 

Others present were: Lord Devonport, Lord Inchcape, Lord Rothermore, Lord Aber- 
conway, Lord Desborough, Sir A. C. Corey-Wright, Sir John Ellerman, Sir Vincent Cail- 
lard, Sir Robert Hadfield, Sir H. Llewellyn Smith, Sir Howard Spicer, Mr. W. L. Hichens, 
Mr. Crawford Vaughan, Mr. Robert P. Skinner, Brigadier-General R. Manley Sims, 
D.S.O., Mr. Axel de Bildt, Mr. Alfred Clark, Mr. E. Manville, Mr. Holt Thomas, Mr. F. N. 
Garrard, Mr. Gordon Selfridge, Colonel E. L'Estrange Malone, Major Evelyn Wrench, 
Mr. M. Bloomfield, Saturday Evening Post; Mr. G. A. Sutton, Mr. Geoffrey Dawson, Mr. 
H. Corbett, Mr. W. Lints Smith, Mr. W. A. Ackland, Mr. J. P. Bland, Mr. M. Humphrey 
Davy, Mr. H. G. Price, Mr. C. Maughan, and Mr. T. S. Sheldrake. 

Two of the American trade editors, Mr. Arthur J. Baldwin, McGraw-Hill Publishing 
Company, and Mr. F. W. Parsons, Coal Age, were unavoidably absent. 

The toast "The King and the President," proposed by Lord Northcliffe, 
was heartily honored. 

40 




LORD NORTHCLIFFE 



Is one of the dominant figures in British affairs to-day. Pre- 
eminently a self-made man, he has arisen to a unique position. 
While refraining from accepting a cabinet position, he directed 
every energy to the successful prosecution of the war, and 
staunchly supported the Government both by personal effort and 
through his great papers — ■•The Times" and "The Daily Mail" 



The Men of the Empire 

Independence of the Press — 

Lord Northcliffe proposed the health of the American Trade Editors. 
In the course of his opening remarks he said:— 

Our guests represent one of the most potent forces in the United States, something 
that exists here in a lesser degree, the great business newspapers that lead the trades at 
which their aims are directed. Some of our friends here appeal every week to hundreds of 
thousands of those engaged in practically every large industry in the United States. The 
power and independence of these business and technical newspapers and their enterprise 
are examples to us. When the Government of the United States went into the war with 
the enthusiasm and thoroughness of which we are all aware, they appealed to the con- 
trollers of these great trade organs to help them, and right well they did it. 

These American gentlemen come from a country in which the newspapers hold a more 
important position than that occupied by the press of our country. They come from a 
country where the controllers of independent newspapers are regarded as men of super 
Cabinet rank. 

The position of the individual newspaper controller like myself, who believes that, 
except under circumstances which rarely occur, and do not at this moment exist, it is his 
duty to decline office, is not so well understood in this country as in the United States of 
America, where the long list of independent newspaper owners, such as Medill, Dana, 
Nelson, Bennett, and Pulitzer stand out as examples of men who believe that a press 
independent of Government favors, independent of its readers, and independent of its 
advertisers is essential to democratic rule. I believe that at the present juncture, with the 
forthcoming inter-Allied Conference and Peace Conference at Paris, any newspaper pro- 
prietor who went to those Conferences in an official capacity would be as effectively gagged 
as he would be if he were willing to accept a place in this Cabinet. 

Britain s New Factories — 

Mr. Beecroft responding said : — 

The Ministry of Information invited us to this country that we might see and learn. 
We have had an opportunity of doing both. During the four and a half years of war you 
have had an opportunity of putting into force various activities which we have heard of 
in the last few months. We have visited your factories, travelling fairly well through 
the length and breadth of your island. It is the factories we are most interested in, and we 
are going to carry back with us a wonderful fund of information. We take it that it is the 
spirit of your country as it is the spirit of ours, that it would be an error if these two lands 
which have been fighting together in France and elsewhere should cease to cooperate and 
work together. (Cheers.) Great problems lie ahead of us. It is only by meeting and 
discussing common problems that we shall be able to work intelligently together. We 
hope that it will not be long before we have corresponding missions from your country 
going over to the United States,, and we shall consider it a wonderful pleasure to do our 
little part in showing you what we have to show. 

We have been amazingly impressed with your war factories. I can only speak of one 
kind of factory — but from all other members of our party I have heard nothing but the 
same words used — the new factories which have sprung up in your country because of the 
war. I spent several months in England several years ago, and the comparisons which it 

41 



American Journalists in Europe 

is possible to draw after visiting ten or twelve factories connected with the aeroplane, auto- 
mobile, and truck industries in this country. The most amazing thing we have observed 
in the great war industries is the great attention you have given to the workers. Men and 
women are largely creatures of environment, and if we want to get the best out of them we 
must give them the most desirable environment. In that respect the factories which we 
have seen this week show a wonderful improvement over those that we visited several years 
ago. A great many of your factories are object-lessons to the world. During the dark 
days of this week we have been in huge factories, some employing 10,000 and 20,000 work- 
ers, and the lighting conditions were so good that not a single electric light was necessary. 
We found out many years ago that the efficiency of the worker was much greater under 
natural than artificial light. In the great period of rivalry and competition which is ahead 
of us, that will work towards greater productivity of the worker. We must take a greater 
interest in the worker than we have ever done before, because we want greater efficiency 
out of the worker. We want him to live a fuller life, and believe that in proportion as he 
does that he will be more efficient. 

Education of the Workers — 

We were almost astounded to see the educational work going on in certain factories. 
We met with great technical societies for education, not only of the heads of departments, 
but all those who wanted to avail themselves of these activities. We found other fac- 
tories with auditoriums, stages, moving picture apparatus, and libraries, and everything 
that will help towards brightening the workers. I do not think we can get too much of that. 
If there is one error we make in all lands, particularly in industrial countries, it is that of 
taking the worker out of school at too early an age. Specialization sets in before the 
strong foundations of elementary education have been properly established. If we keep 
boys and girls in the public and high schools for a longer period they will become more 
efficient workers than they have been in the past. It would be a mistake if after the war 
we went along in certain channels as we did before, and built up conditions that might 
bring about a recurrence of what happened in 191 1. We want to make that impossible. 
The industries of the different nations must understand each other better. (Cheers.) 
There is an opportunity for cooperation in industry, with great results. We are mostly 
concerned in our country with the wage problem. Wages have gone up in many industries 
125 per cent in the last three years, and in some industries higher. Our living costs haves 
increased sixty-two per cent in some industries, in others more. That means that a great 
deal of surplus money has flowed into the pockets of the wage-earners. We are glad. 
In the majority of American industries there is no desire to revert to the old pre-war wage 
scale. This has been a war of industries. Industries have done their part as it was never 
thought possible for them to do it, and the reconstruction work for the future greatness of 
our people will largely depend on the cooperation and work of these industries. We hope 
the industries will get together, and we are looking forward with great pleasure at these 
gatherings to hear what the leaders of industry have to say on these various problems. 
We must pass on to higher stages of individual efficiency, and to greater production, and we 
must always welcome those machines and combinations of machinery which will lift the 
workmen up to a higher level. We have to lead the workmen to see that the machine is 
not his enemy, but his friend. This will call for a great deal of interchange of thought. 
We know no better way of bringing that about than through the business Press. We, who 
are connected with the business Press in America, are very proud of it. It has done won- 

42 



The Men of the Empire 

derful work since the war. It has taken a position of leadership; it has not been content 
to lag behind and merely to be a reflector of activities that have taken place. We look 
forward to the time when the business Press of this country will be working hand in hand 
with the business Press of America in the great leadership of industry, on which the world 
is so dependent for the future. (Cheers.) 

Industry and Education — 

Mr. H. C. Parmelee (Chemical and Metallurgical Engineering), who also 
responded, said: — 

My Lords and Gentlemen : — We should be lacking in candor if we did not say first of 
all how much we appreciate the hospitality with which we have been welcomed here. 
We have heard many comments since we arrived regarding the little differences and idio- 
syncrasies of our respective peoples. A few days ago in the offices of the Ministry of In- 
formation a young lady typist said to me, "I am glad to get acquainted with some of you 
Americans. You are not just exactly what we thought you were because we always had an 
idea you were so conceited." I said, "Isn't it strange? We always had the same idea 
about you. Probably the only difference is that we talk about it and you didn't." 

From the time this war began I have been thinking that there are three factors that 
have played a very important part in our success: the technical school, the engineering 
magazine and the research institution. I believe that just in proportion as the English 
and the American nations foster these three factors, industry and education will make 
progress with mutual benefit. I believe that England has realized more than any other 
nation the importance of the technical man in this war and the corresponding importance 
of technical education. We have been fighting an enemy who has developed technology 
in the highest degree and who had made more progress than any of us in applying science 
to industry. As a consequence when war was declared England found that it was not to the 
lawyer and clergyman of Oxford or Cambridge to whom she turned for help, but to her 
chemists, physicists and metallurgists who had worked in the background and without 
much public recognition. The lesson undoubtedly will be taken to heart, and more atten- 
tion will be given to the technical and scientific schools of the kindgom. 

The war has cleared up some unfortunate misconceptions, one of which was that most 
of the chemical knowledge of the world resided in German factories. For some reason or 
other we had come to think of the German people in terms of chemistry and attributed 
to them knowledge and ability which they did not possess in greater measure than the 
rest of us. You will search the history of chemistry in vain for a single instance in which 
a German has initiated fundamental laws of chemistry or produced any of the epoch-making 
discoveries in that science. The basis of chemistry was evolved by English and French 
scientists but the German people put the ideas into practice and built great industries upon 
them. They have established the closest cooperation between industry and the university 
and have set an example which we could well follow. 

Speaking for both your country and mine, I believe that we now have the opportunity 
of establishing ourselves and our industries on a sound scientific basis. The technical 
school should receive your support, the engineering magazine should be developed to the 
highest degree as a medium of education and finally the research institution should be 
encouraged because through its activities the nation will make rapid progress. 

43 



American Journalists in Europe 

Lord Inchcape, who was also invited to speak, observed that in the 
future British industry would probably be more up against the industry of 
America than it had ever been before. But competition was the life-blood 
of enterprise, and they might depend upon it that, whether we were in 
competition with America and America in competition with us, it would 
not be a matter of one Government or one country against the other, but 
would be one enterprise against another. He hoped sincerely that we 
should hold our own, and at the same time that America would go on 
developing. He felt sure that the relations which had been brought about 
by America having come to our assistance in this war would never be for- 
gotten, and that we should continue as we were now, the closest of friends, 
in spite of any competition which might take place between us as indi- 
viduals. (Cheers.) 

Need of Increased Production — 
Mr. W. L. Hichens said: 

One thing that must have struck your American guests today is that we in England 
do not sing the same song. There is a very healthy difference of opinion among most of us. 
There is no stereotyped labor view or employers' view. We hold different views and, for 
my own part, I cannot claim to represent the employers in anything that I say. All of us 
are interested today in the big subject of reconstruction, and I think you will all have 
noticed that reconstruction is really aimed primarily at improving the condition of the 
workers themselves. We want to maintain wages, or, if possible, to increase them. We 
should like to reduce working hours, to deal with the problem of unemployment, with the 
question of decasualization, and to improve education. To solve such problems in a 
generous spirit will cost a power of money. According to statisticians, the income of this 
country before the war was 7,000,000 pounds a day, or about three shillings per head for 
every man, woman and child. Three shillings a day is a very small sum on which to 
work out the ideal state we want to see. We all realize that that can be secured only by 
increasing production. Production can only be increased in two ways. One is by improv- 
ing mechanical improvements in our railways, great improvements in all our factories. 
That will cost us a great deal. Even more important is to increase the output from the 
worker himself. In the past one of the greatest troubles of this country has been the 
restriction of output. We have to get the workers to realize that it is not merely in his own 
interests, but in that of the community as a whole, that he should produce as much as he 
can without any kind of restriction. That is a problem that concerns us more than you in 
the United States. 

How are you going to secure those two things — the capital that is required for improved 
mechanical devices and the increased output from labor? I would submit as an indi- 
vidual opinion that they can only be secured in one way. That is, if we can assure both 
sides, namely, the capitalists and the workers, that the increased wealth is going to be 
fairly distributed between the two. That is fundamental. The capitalist says, "I am not 
going to take trouble to save and put my money into this or that development unless I 

44 



The Men of the Empire 

can see some reasonable return." The worker says, "I am not going to put my best ener- 
gies into the work unless I see that I am going to have a fair share of the result. "That can 
never be secured without a radical change in the outlook of this country today. You have 
the employer on the one hand, organizing himself in order that he might be the most efficient 
in this struggle, and the worker with his trade union, organizing himself so that he might 
be most efficient in the struggle. The State did nothing, except to keep the ring. The 
Church said, "This has nothing to do with us. It is not a religious question. We will leave 
it severely alone." 

The Community as Final Judge — 

But you cannot divide things into watertight compartments. This is a moral question 
more than anything else. I think we can only get away from the old theory by accepting 
the view that no one is entitled to be the final judge in his own cause. It is not right 
that the capitalist should have the last word as to the amount of profit he is to make in any 
enterprise. The principle must be considered that each industry caters for the 
consumer, in other words, for the community as a whole. Industry ought to be at the 
service of the community as a whole. It is not right that any section should claim to 
determine how much of the profit it is going to have for itself. That is really the claim 
that the capitalist has put forward. The capitalist has to submit to the principle that the 
State should determine what is a fair and reasonable return. In other words, I believe the 
principle of the excess profits tax is right. I know it is not in all respects popular. I wel- 
come most heartily the commendation given to that tax in the leading article in The Times 
today, because I believe it is fundamental in any settlement of this labor problem. On the 
other hand, labor is no more entitled than capital to hold the community up to ransom, 
and to pillage them by means of strong combinations. It is wrong for the electricians to 
come forward and say the Albert Hall shall not be used for a certain purpose because they 
disapprove of it. It is their function to supply electricity, and it is for some other body 
to determine the other question. Labor is entitled to put forward its case as strongly as 
it may, but, having done that, must recognize that there is a superior authority. Each 
section thinks it ought to do what its strength entitles it to do. That is the principle that 
might is right, which we have been fighting against in the war. Are we going to support 
the application of that principle in our own countries? I contend that it is for every civil- 
ized nation and every individual in a civilized nation to fight the principle that might is 
right in their own countries as they have fought it elsewhere. (Cheers.) 

The Shipping Outlook — 

Sir John Ellerman said : 

We were faced in this country with a new phase of competition that had never occurred 
to any serious extent before, and that was that in the future America and other nations 
would take a very prominent position in the shipping industries of the world. We should 
only secure what he might call common effort to advance the welfare of the world if on the 
one hand we were prepared to pay reasonable rates of wages to our men, and on the other 
hand we cooperated with those States and with those countries where hitherto we had 
carried on trade almost exclusively. It was to future cooperation with America that we 
looked to see the joint flags rolling in most countries in the world where formerly the English 
and German flags alone were seen. (Cheers.) 

45 



American Journalists in Europe 

Mr. Gordon Selfridge expressed the hope that the war would give us 
that Avhich we all so much desired, namely, closer intercourse between the 
English-speaking peoples of the world. If we could bring our two peoples 
together by means of American people coming over here and people here 
going over there it seemed to him that we could do very much toward 
making the English-speaking peoples the controllers of the destinies of the 
world. As to the question of excess profits referred to by Mr. Hichens, 
the system would be fair only if it took in every one. As at present admin- 
istered it seemed as if the excess profits tax put a handicap on those who 
tried the hardest, while those who were going along as they did before the 
war in that easy-going way were not affected at all. 

The Forty-eight Hours' Week — 
Sir Robert Hadfield said: 

I have tried to be somewhat of a pioneer in regard to the question of labor. Some 
twenty-five years ago I took the opportunity of trying the experiment of giving a forty- 
eight-hour week to my workmen. I must confess that I got some of my ideas from my 
visit to America. I found that in some cases there the workers did not start until they 
had had breakfast. I was sure it was only a rational way to expect a workman to start 
his work. He could not be expected to go to work before he had had something to eat, 
and in America, although they have a longer working day than we have, they followed out 
that principle. My own firm twenty-five years ago introduced the forty-eight-hour week. 
We were told that we should land in disaster. It has been anything but that. There 
has been a very great advantage in a shorter working day, and in this country only a few 
days ago a forty-eight-hour week was adopted by the employers of the northeast coast of 
England. 

It seems to me we have the greatest opportunity that has presented itself in the history 
of the world. We have England and America working side by side. Why should we not 
extend that principle? Why should not wages in England be as good as the wages in 
America and the hours of working just the same in the two countries? The men are very 
much the same. We have the finest opportunity of exchanging ideas by the wonderful 
way we have been brought together in this war. We are together now. Do let us remain 
together, and work side by side, not merely from the selfish point of view of earning money 
and paying dividends, but of trying to raise the condition of humanity. A secretary or a 
clerk, is given a ten days' holiday and paid his wages, but when the worker puts down his 
tools he gets no remuneration. I do not see why the time has not come when the worker 
also should be able to have a week or ten days' holiday and be paid for it. I believe ways 
could be found of carrying out such a proposal. 

The Aeroplane Movement — 

There are many things we can learn from America. The patent system in England 
is a long way behind. I believe that to a large extent the wonderful progress in America 
has been due to your magnificent patent system. As to your file wrapper system there 
is not one Englishman in a thousand who knows what it is. We don't have such things 

46 




H. H. ASQUITH 



Was Prime Minister of Great Britain in the earlier stages of 
the war — a man of great legal attainments and a leader for many 
years in British politics. Be was succeeded in the portfolio of 
Prime Minister by David Lloyd George in December, 1916 



The Men of the Empire 

here. I think we should learn from you. If Lord Northcliffe would lend the aid of his 
powerful papers to bring that about, I believe he would greatly benefit the country. We 
owe a great deal to Lord Northcliffe. Had it not been for him we should never have had 
aeroplanes among us to protect us. Thanks to his wise and farseeing spirit, he started 
that movement, from which, I am thankful to say, we in London benefited. 

Mr. H. M. Swetland (President, United Publishers' Corporation), in 
proposing the health of Lord Northcliffe, acknowledged the hospitality 
which the party had received in this country. Not the least of the lessons 
which they had learned, he said, was the lesson of hospitality. They were 
tremendously impressed with the technical schooling which was being 
given in some of the industries in this country. It was not possible that 
the industrial papers of America, which did not enter into the great political 
questions of the day, could do the good their host had done, but they would 
go back and try to emulate him. 

Lord Northcliffe acknowledged the toast. 

After the luncheon the visitors were conducted over The Times office, 
and had an opportunity of witnessing the printing of the Library Edition 
of The Times. 

The Circle of Scientific, Technical and Trade Journalists — 

We attended a meeting which had been previously arranged with the 
great publishers of England. The Circle of Scientific, Technical and Trade 
Journalists which held the meeting, under an invitation from the Worshipful 
Master and Wardens of the Company of Stationers at Stationers' Hall, 
received us in this old forum of publications with almost Masonic formality. 
We were presented to the Worshipful Master and Wardens, and then 
joined at tea the members of the Circle. 

This old Company of Stationers has for many years performed the 
function of copyright privileges. After the tea, which was provided in the 
big reception room, we were taken into a lecture room where a formal 
meeting was held, at which addresses were made by members of our party 
and responses by the great English publishers. The following report of 
the meeting was given us before leaving England: 

THE CIRCLE OF SCIENTIFIC, TECHNICAL AND TRADE JOURNALISTS 

On December 18, 1918, a large and representative gathering of London 
Trade Journalists, called by the Circle, assembled at the Stationers' Hall 
to meet the party of American Trade Journalists now on a visit to London 
as guests of the Government. The party were the guests of the Master 
and Wardens of the Worshipful Company of Stationers, by whom they 

47 



American Journalists in Europe 

were officially welcomed to a tea and reception, the Chairman of the Circle, 
Mr. L. Gaster, subsequently returning thanks for the visitors. 

An informal conference was then held in the Court Room, Mr. L. Gaster 
presiding, and a number of points of great interest in regard to the man- 
agement and functions of technical journals were discussed. On behalf 
of the guest journalists from the United States, short addresses were deliv- 
ered by Mr. H. C. Parmelee, Editor of Chemical and Metallurgical Engineer- 
ing; Mr. S. 0. Dunn, Editor of The Railway Age; Mr. H. C. Estep, Editorial 
Director of the Penton Publishing Company; Mr. Horace M. Swetland, 
President of the United Publishers' Corporation; Mr. Arthur J. Baldwin, 
McGraw-Hill Publishing Company. 

The speakers gave a number of striking instances of the valuable co- 
operation of the technical press with the United States Government in 
connection with the war, and emphasized the importance of the technical 
editor preserving independence of judgment, while working in cooperation 
with the business management. This latter point was strongly endorsed 
both by Mr. Swetland and Mr. Baldwin, who are responsible for the man- 
agement of many technical journals, and by the various editors. Professor 
MacLean also gave a short address emphasizing the importance to the 
journalists of a comprehensive and wide course of training. 

Mr. H. C. Estep, responding for the American party on the editorial 
policies of American business publications, said: 

British business and technical publications certainly should be congratulated on the 
successful way in which they "carried on" during the war, at the same time performing 
services of great value to the Government. Some of the most influential technical papers 
in the world are published in Great Britain. Particularly I think they are to be con- 
gratulated on their success in obtaining articles dealing with the scientific fundamentals 
of engineering and production. 

The editorial ideals of the leading British business and technical papers corresponded 
with those of their American contemporaries. Briefly expressed, the ideal of the modern 
publication in the business field is to live for and not on the industry which it represents. 
This requires an aggressive constructive editorial policy which recognizes clearly the 
necessity for leadership, coupled with constant striving toward more effective service of a 
practical character. The American technical editor has constantly before him the advice 
of the late John A. Hill, one of the greatest publishers of engineering journals who ever 
lived, who stated repeatedly that "a technical paper which does not teach its readers how 
to do things in their particular line better, cheaper or faster, has no excuse to live." 

To be even a partial success and realize some of the ideals of his profession, the technical 
editor must wear out the soles of his shoes rather than the seat of his pants. In other 
words, it is necessary for him to keep constantly in touch with the latest developments in 
the sphere in which his publication operates by means of direct personal contact with the 
industry itself and its leaders. The successful editor is always something of a teacher, 
but he must constantly guard against getting into a rut and falling behind the times. A 

48 



The Men of the Empire 

technical or business publication should be like an outpost on the battle-line, always in 
touch with the very latest developments. The editor should be constantly seeking that 
which is true and new, and while he should be willing to forget the old when it is super- 
seded, he must not lose sight of the fact that old ideas and methods are not necessarily bad 
just because of their antiquity. 

Successful publishers in the business field in the United States believe in the integrity 
and independence of the editor. They realize that the editor is the servant of the readers 
of the publication and that, therefore, his usefulness is destroyed if he is made subservient 
to the advertising or business department. The editor and the advertising manager should 
cooperate, to be sure, but neither should dominate the other. While both should be 
independent, both should realize that they are common servants of the same master — 
the industry which the publication represents. 

The editor should avoid shooting over the heads of his readers and constituents, and 
while preserving independence of judgment he should not forget that the advertisers are a 
part of the business. In brief, the ideal editor should be a compound of a statesman, 
philosopher, preacher, teacher and business man and perhaps something of a poet as well. 

Professor Gregory, Nature; Mr. L. Pendred, The Engineer, and Mr. A. C. 
Meyjes, The Ironmonger, spoke on behalf of the British Press, entirely 
corroborating the views expressed by the representatives of the American 
Press, and especially that of the independence of the editor. Mr. Pendred 
proposed a vote of thanks to the American guests for attending the meeting 
at unavoidably short notice, the vote being carried with acclamation. 

The following resolution was moved by Mr. H. C. Parmelee, seconded 
by Mr. A. C. Meyjes, The Ironmonger, and passed unanimously: 

That this meeting of American and British editors, representing the trade and technical 
press of both nations, records its satisfaction at the alliance between the great branches of 
the English-speaking race, expresses its earnest desire that the union formed for war pur- 
poses should be permanently continued in the cause of peace, and to this end urges a closer 
cooperation and periodical exchange of views between the trade and technical press of both 
countries on subjects of scientific, educational and industrial interest. 

The Chairman closed the discussion with a brief account of some 
of his experiences when visiting America in 1907 and 1913. Mr. Baldwin, 
responding for the visitors, extended a very cordial invitation for a depu- 
tation from the British Technical Press to visit the United States. 

Conclusions — ■ 

Our party was much impressed by these semi-social functions and fully 
appreciative of the great privileges extended to us. The personal contact 
with the great men of the Empire, the men who are not only shaping the 
destinies of that vast domain but whose influence is felt in every corner 
of the globe, was at once an inspiration and an education. While their 

49 



American Journalists in Europe 

oratory outclassed our simple responses we found ourselves in accord with 
the underlying sentiment of every address and in full sympathy with the 
ideals that prompted both England and America to carry their standards 
into France to protect the civilization of the world. No mercenary note 
provoked a discord. Even the protest that England must retain control 
of the seas was sweetened by the concluding statement "in the interest of 
universal civilization." In this protection America is expected to perform 
her part. We even began to appreciate the extreme formalities where we 
saw that much of this was a perpetuation of institutional prerogative. 
The toastmaster, with his gavel and his stentorian voice, the Lord Mayor 
and his golden equipage, and the King and his retinue became to us as they 
are to the Empire — symbols of a great civilization and sacred in their signi- 
ficance. In no other way than by the unusual opportunities afforded us 
could hereditary and institutional England have given a full realization of 
the meaning and importance of these ancient customs. 



0& 



INDUSTRIES OF ENGLAND AND FRANCE 
IN TIMES OF WAR— III 



." GTTvl 



HE time when the business man cherished secrets, and carefully 
secluded and jealously guarded his process of production has 
passed. Cooperation has avoided the wastes of competition, and 
efficiency has been increased by the more confidential relation be- 
tween employer and employee. A nation is nothing less than a business or- 
ganization. Its prime obligation is to so organize and relate its productive 
capacity as to insure to each individual a proper return for his effort. As 
the individual business enterprises have learned from experience the 
benefits of unselfish cooperation, so the nations of the world are beginning 
to realize that industrial progress depends upon international cooperation. 
Their commercial rivalry in the world market must be as fair and open as 
the competition in the home market, and the same principles must be 
adopted to secure national efficiency as are employed by the individual. 

A new epoch is opening in the industrial history of the world, in which a 
better understanding among commercial nations and the desire to do away 
with national egotism are rapidly growing. Our invitation to see the 
industries of England and France showed one of the ways in which the 
English people were endeavoring to establish a means for the exchange of 
ideas on industrial conditions even in time of war. 

Industry and War — 

The one purpose, to help win the war, was dominating every industry 
of England and France at this time. Whether it was the making of ammu- 
nition or garments, the same motif was behind every individual's work, 
"How does my work help defeat Germany?" England and France were 
submerged in the one thought "Victory," and were spurred on to the same 
effort "Work to win." They were fighting Germany not only with their 
armies and navies, but with their industries. A great army of industrial 
workers stood behind the men at the front, and it was their fight to "speed 
up," make more, increase production, that finally brought about the defeat 

51 



American Journalists in Europe 

of the foe. It was an industrial war from beginning to end. Without the 
second line of defense of food, supplies and ammunition, the armies in 
France would have been useless. The strategy that brought victory was as 
much that carried on in the shops as it was that on the field. 

Every plant that we visited, every man that we interviewed, gave evi- 
dence of this great purpose. Men and women worked as they had never 
worked before. The leaders of industry, spurred on by the same determina- 
tion to win, studied new methods, worked out new schemes and employed 
every available means for increasing production. The war spirit was 
everywhere, and tended to unite the great industries in the greatest enter- 
prise that has ever been undertaken. 

And, as a result of this mighty and united effort, as a reward for the 
unselfish endeavor of every man and woman in the industrial world, England 
and France found themselves, in 1918, producing more than they ever had 
before in spite of the handicaps of war. 

Production Increased — ■ 

Many factories were doubled or tripled in their capacity. The Beard- 
more Plant, at Glasgow, running on war work, had been doubled in the last 
two years. The Hadfield Steel concern was greatly enlarged for the manu- 
facture of guns and shells. Automobile factories were expanded in order 
to produce aircraft, army trucks, munitions and war products. The Austin 
Motor Company, employing 22,000 people, was one of the largest that we 
saw. The old town of Gretna Green, in Scotland, sprang from a little 
village of romance into a great manufacturing center almost over night. 
In France also, production was being undertaken on a larger scale than it 
had ever been before. The great Andre citron plant employed 12,000 
people. It was complete in its mechanical equipment, and had its own 
elaborate laboratories. 

Efficiency Increased — 

Efficiency was greatly increased by this large scale production. The 
latest labor and time-saving devices were in common use in England and 
France. They had learned the value of automatic assembly, moving plat- 
forms and all the American tricks for increasing production. The plants 
were running at top speed. There was a sufficient labor supply in spite of 
the great drain caused by the raising of armies. In some places, as in 
Coventry, motor lorries collected the people from the country and brought 
them to the factories. Women were employed in almost every line of 
industry. We saw women employed in munition plants, on the trains, 

52 



Industries in Time of War 

driving taxis. Two-thirds of the employees of the Andre citron plant were 
women. Their work was estimated in one place to be more efficient than 
the previous work of men in the same plant. Although the new methods 
of production were partially accountable for the increased productivity, 
the greater part was due to the effort of each man or woman to do his best 
to help win the war. 

Better Working Conditions — 

The working conditions of the laborer were receiving more attention 
than they ever had before. The problem of his welfare was not overlooked 
in the great rush to increase production; on the contrary it was considered 
of the greatest importance not only for the increase of production, but for 
the realization of the ideals that the Allies were fighting for. Mr. Hall, 
Manager of the Austin Motor Company's plant, aptly expressed the chang- 
ing attitude of the English manufacturer toward labor when he said that 
he had faith in the Labor Party, believing that it is the day when the labor 
element of all countries will see better times, and that more attention must be 
given to them. They deserve better houses, he said, better food, better 
pay, educational advantages, for all these things tend to the uplifting of the 
Empire. He spoke very forcibly about the English institutions. He said, 
"In London they will show you the gilt and tinsel and frippery of royalty. 
They will talk of institutions, and their habits and customs, but you may be 
certain that the people have gotten beyond this, and the ancient and hon- 
ored institutions of England will be forced to give place to the practical 
development of the industries of the Empire." The munition plant in 
Gretna Green had a model community of concrete and plaster houses for the 
employees. A munition plant in Paris was running an up-to-date res- 
taurant where 4,000 people could be seated at once. In that city, also, 
one of the factories employing many women, was maintaining a nursery 
where mothers could nurse their infants during working hours. Children 
could be left here for care during the day, and if the parents desired, they 
could be continuously cared for until they were six years old. 

The great change that the war had brought about seemed in no way 
to daunt the eagerness and determination of the people of England and 
France to get back on a peace-time basis as soon as possible. The period of 
transition and reconstruction presents problems as difficult as those of 
waging war. Great Britain has remained a free trade country throughout 
her whole history. 



53 



American Journalists in Europe 

Coal and Iron — 

The principal natural products are coal, iron and tin. The English coal 
fields are scattered throughout the midland and northern portions. There 
are also extens ; ve coal deposits in Scotland, and, owing to the configuration 
of the coast line they can supply ships directly with bunker coal, and 
their position has helped the great shipbuilding industries of the Clyde, 
Newcastle and Lancashire. There are extensive coal fields in Warwick, 
Stafford, York, Derby and Northumberland, and they have contributed 
to make Birmingham the center of an immense iron manufacturing trade. 
In fact, the twelve-mile strip between Birmingham and Wolverhamp- 
ton is known as "The Black Country." Wales has extensive coal fields 
which are said to produce the best steam coal in the world. In normal 
times the navies of the world, with the possible exception of that of the 
United States, used Welsh coal exclusively when available . It is estimated 
that there are 1,000,000 workers employed in this industry; that the total 
production approximates 300,000,000 tons of coal per year, and that the 
total value is about $900,000,000. In 1914, Great Britain produced twenty- 
two per cent of the entire coal production of the world. 

In almost every case, the iron ore is mined in districts immediately 
adjoining the coal deposits, a fact which permits the smelting to be carried 
out with a minimum of transportation. It is estimated that there are 
200,000 workers employed in this industry, the approximate annual output 
of which is about 8,000,000 tons of iron and steel valued at $150,000,000. 

Textile Industries — 

During the war the textile industries of England were running under 
Government control, and the output was reduced to fifty per cent of normal. 
The machinery needs renovation, the supply of coal is insufficient, and the 
supply of raw materials is still limited by the Government. Increased 
wages make the problem of reconstruction difficult in this trade as in others. 
The transition from Government to private control will cause a great dis- 
turbance in the industry, and the buying of raw materials is hampered by 
these uncertain conditions. 

Manchester and Lancashire are the centers of the cotton industry, the main 
source of supply of raw material being the United States. Belfast, Ireland, 
is the center of the linen industry, much of its wealth being derived from 
the growing of flax and the manufacture of the finished product. During 
the war it became necessary to commandeer the entire resources of the 
linen mills, as it was for a time deemed impossible to use any fabric other 

54 



Industries in Time of War 

than linen for airplane wings. The industry was also seriously handicapped 
by the lack of flaxseed, which formerly had been imported from Russia. 

In Yorkshire, Leeds, Huddersfield and Halifax are the centers of the 
wool industry of England. There is also a large trade in re-manufactured 
wool usually known to the trade as shoddy. It is estimated that there are 
over 1,000,000 workers engaged in the textile industry of the United King- 
dom, two-thirds of whom are women. 

Shipping — 

In 1914, the mercantile marine of the United Kingdom consisted of 
12,862 steamers, 19.145,140 gross tons; and 8,203 sailing vessels, 864,679 
gross tons; a total of 21,065 vessels, 20,009,819 tons. In the same year, 
281 sailing vessels of 29,107 net tons, and 858 steam vessels of 1.006,065 
net tons, were built. In 1912 there were 286,806 seamen employed on 
British vessels. The total tonnage of British and foreign shipping entered 
at the various ports of the United Kingdom in 1914 was 71,126, 162, and the 
total tonnage cleared from the same ports was 68,963,076. This was 
exclusive of vessels engaged in coasting trade or in connection with the war. 
It is interesting to note that during the period 1899-1913, the United 
Kingdom produced sixty per cent of the entire world's output of ships. 
The shipbuilding industry is hampered until the terms of peace are decid- 
ed upon, but the production of merchant ships will probably be undertaken 
on a larger scale than ever before. The ships that are in use will need over- 
hauling and a great deal of repairing, for they have been kept running during 
the war at any cost. According to recent figures, the total number of mer- 
chant ships built in 1914 was 656, with a total tonnage of 1,683,553. 

Tra nsportation — 

In December, 1914, there were 23,701 miles of railway open for traffic 
in the United Kingdom, the capital of the various companies reaching a 
total of $7,109,240,000. The total receipts were $700,000,000. When 
Great Britain entered the war the wages the railways were paying amounted 
to about $250,000,000 a year. Various grants of "war bonuses" and "war 
wages" have been made with the result that the wages now being paid 
amount to about $525,000,000 a year. The advances in wages amount to 
more than the net earnings of the railway companies before the war, which 
were about $250,000,000. In addition to the advances in wages which 
already had been made, the principle of an eight-hour-day is to be put into 
effect, which will increase the payroll another $125,000,000. 

In other words, the total increase in the cost of railway labor in Great 
Britain since the war began will soon be 150 per cent greater than the total 



American Journalists in Europe 

net earnings of the companies were before the war. Passenger rates have 
been advanced fifty per cent, but no advance has been made in freight 
rates, and it is contended by the shippers of Great Britain that the freight 
rates already are so high that British industry could not bear a substantial 
advance in them. Therefore, the present administration in Great Britain 
seems to have concluded that there is nothing it can do but adopt govern- 
ment ownership. No economist or business man in Great Britain believes 
that the railways would be more efficiently or economically operated by the 
state than by private companies. Furthermore, there is a strong sentiment 
to the effect that even though the government buys the railways it should 
lease them to private companies for operation. 

The motor companies are turning their efforts toward producing com- 
mercial vehicles. The leading motor companies are looking to the American 
market for the sale of their surplus products and are planning large com- 
mercial aircraft capable of carrying forty or fifty passengers. They are 
continuing their production of steam lorries and trucks, and are expecting 
to begin at once the manufacture of automobiles of several sizes. The 
transition period in the munition plants will be facilitated by the work of 
rebuilding machinery for Belgium, France and England. 

Coal Fields of France — ■ 

France, of course, was the greatest sufferer from the vandalism of the 
Germans. Her industries in the north of France were entirely destroyed. 
One-third of the coal fields of France were centered around Lens, and these 
were so completely ruined that reconstruction is almost impossible. All 
valuable mining machinery was stolen or destroyed ; the shafts were blasted 
and the mines flooded. There are no means of transporting or housing 
laborers left in this district. The total coal production of France in 1913 was 
40,275,485 tons. The coal fields of France have a total area of nearly 1,200 
square miles. Lens is the center of the great coal-producing region bearing 
that name. The territory in which Lens is located is from five to ten miles 
wide, and covers an area of more than 400 square miles. In this district, 
before the war, were numerous villages and towns, where the miners work- 
ing in the collieries were housed. Approximately 180,000 people lived in 
the region. In the pre-war period the district furnished approximately 
seventy per cent of the entire French production. The Lens region was 
also the chief by-product. coking center. Nearly all of the coal produced in 
France is bituminous of a good quality. France has little anthracite, and 
is also short of coals for making gas and coke. The greater part of the coal 
was produced from beds that lie more than 1,000 feet below the surface. 

56 



Industries in Time of War 

A number of the shafts exceed 3,000 feet in depth. In many of the collieries 
ten and sometimes twelve separate and distinct seams of coal were worked. 
One of the beds in the vicinity of Lens averaged twenty-three feet in thick- 
ness, while at a number of mines the seams were successfully worked at not 
to exceed eighteen to twenty inches thick. The output per individual em- 
ployee in the French mines was never equal to the large production of the 
individual American miner. In 1913, the average production of each 
French coal miner was slightly more than one ton per day. Many prob- 
lems occur in mining the French coal seams that are not common to 
American practice. 

Minerals of France— 

The Departments of Pas-de-Calais, Somme, Aisne, Nord, Ardennes and 
Meurthe-et-Moselle were, before the war, the principal centers of the pig- 
iron, steel, wrought steel, and copper industries. In France, there was a 
trend, before the war, towards concentration. This development particu- 
larly characterized the steel industry. The total production of iron ore, 
pig-iron, copper and other metals, including nickel, tin, lead, aluminum, 
antimony and zinc, in 1913, was 27,000,000 tons. The French steel mills 
have made considerable progress in the manufacture of high grade tool steel, 
and it is probable that the industry will be fostered. Before the war, the 
invaded territory furnished France with ninety per cent of the iron ore, 
eighty-three per cent of the pig-iron, and seventy-five per cent of the steel. 
An estimate of the amount invested in the iron mines, blast furnaces and steel 
works of northern France before the war is given as $500,000,000. 

Textiles of France — - 

The mill towns of France also centered largely in the area that was devas- 
tated by the Germans. Before the war, the cotton and woolen machinery 
of France was divided as follows: 

Cotton spindles 7,400,000 Worsted spinning spindles 2,500.000 

Cotton looms 135,000 Wool spinning spindles 750,000 

Wool cards and combs 2,500 Wool and worsted looms 55,000 

In 1912, France imported about $12,500,000 of cotton fabrics, and 
$6,000,000 of cotton yarn. The cotton machinery of France before the war 
was about one-quarter that of the United States, and its consumption of 
raw material was 1,200,000 bales as compared with the United States of 
7,500,000 bales. The woolen and worsted spinning industry of France is 
about two-thirds that of the United States, which has 4,700,000 wool and 
worsted spindles, including both producing and twisting spindles, and 
75,000 looms as compared with 55,000 in France. The Departments of 

57 



American Journalists in Europe 

Lille, Roubaix, and Tourcoing have been for 800 years the center of the 
textile industry in Europe. 

Reconstr net ion — 

In spite of the devastated industries of France, and the paralyzed indus- 
tries of both England and France, in spite of the problems of reconstruction 
and transition, the commercial outlook of these two countries is far from 
discouraging. The lessons of large-scale production and increased speed, 
taught by the war, will be brought to bear upon future undertakings. It is be- 
lieved that women will remain in industries, doing light mechanical and 
clerical work. Wages will remain higher, and labor conditions will not re- 
vert to the lower standards of the past. Although the labor problem is 
much the same there as it is here, its solution is helped in England by the 
fact that a labor party exists, and there is not the abuse of party "catering" 
to labor rates. America no longer has a monopoly of quantitative produc- 
tion, for England and France are both applying the most advanced methods 
of large scale production. 

The rebuilding of the ruined industries of France will probably be aided 
by the indemnity to be paid by Germany. These countries may have the 
advantages of shipping in competition with America. The cost of building 
ships is less there than here, and their merchant ships greatly outnumber 
ours. Now that they have adopted American ideas of production, their 
chance in the world market is equal to ours, for in this country wages are 
still higher than the increased wages of Europe, and our merchant marine 
is still in its babyhood of development. 

But never before in the history of the world has there been such an oppor- 
tunity for the industrial cooperation of nations. Of what benefit is an ex- 
pansion of international industrial information unless it exerts an influence 
to international industrial cooperation. The time was when each man 
manufactured his own clothing and everything else which he possessed. 
The experience of the ages has taught the wisdom of the exchange of com- 
modities, allowing the individual to specialize some one product which he 
exchanges for other specialized products. This practice secures to the in- 
dividual products of much higher quality, and the higher efficiency of the 
specialized worker gives the individual a wider range of the world's products. 
So international industrial reconstruction must coordinate and regulate the 
industries of the nations. Each must specialize on its particular products, 
and these must be exchanged for other specialized products with the 
same confidence and fairness that has established the exchange between 
individuals. 

58 



IN THE WAKE OF WAR— IV 



rr\ 



HERE will be more wars!" Mr. Churchill said to me. • If his 
prophecy comes true it would look as though the progress of man 
were downward, that the fruits of civilization were only the 
development of scientific means of destruction; and it would seem 
that America had responded to a false call, and that the great victory was 
meaningless. It was not until we were taken to see the battle scenes of 
France that we could understand the barbarism implied in the world 
"war." No man, soldier or civilian, that has come back from the front has 
been able to describe its horrible scenes. He has seen it and felt it. He 
understands it, but words are too feeble to portray the things he has wit- 
nessed. Our trip gave us an unusual opportunity to get a glimpse of the 
great machinery of war, and to witness the havoc and devastation which 
followed its operation. 

The Great Fleet — 

The Great Fleet lay at Rosyth in the Firth of Forth at the time of the 
armistice, and the main object of our trip to Scotland was to see it. We 
motored down from Edinburgh to the harbor and embarked on a steam 
launch. It was a cold, foggy day, and not a sign of the great array of ships 
could be seen when we started out. Rut suddenly one great man-of-war 
loomed up before us, and then another and another in endless repetition. 
We passed hundreds of torpedo boats and destroyers, and then an endless 
line of large cruisers, battleships and dreadnaughts, and yet we were wit- 
nessing only a part of England's great naval reserve. We understood then 
England's right to the title "The mistress of the seas." 

It seemed impossible that such a monstrous fleet should be kept in trim, 
ready for action, and yet should lie, day in and day out, in idleness during 
the war. Yet the silent victory on the sea was as great in its way as that 
on the land. Without a dominant battle above water, the great fleet held 
its own because of its unrivaled strength. There was no direct conflict 
of the whole fleet on the sea, Admiral Sims had said, because no German 
man-of-war dared to venture from its harbor of safety. I could picture the 
surrender of Germany's naval forces as we sailed past the great ships. "We 

59 



American Journalists in Europe 

couldn't trust them," Admiral Sims said, "They had to pass between 
two columns of our ships reaching out from the harbor into the North Sea. 
Every man was at his post. Every gun was loaded. Every ship was 
ready for their treachery." 

But some one who knows should write the story of the British patrol, 
their constant devotion to duty under the most uncomfortable and dan- 
gerous conditions, their refusal to be intimidated or deterred from returning 
to sea even after they had been torpedoed one or more times. About 5,000 
small craft have been engaged in this work of coast patrol, mine sweeping 
and convoying, cruising at times a total of 6,000,000 miles in a single month, 
and providing throughout the war for the safe carriage from all ports and in 
all directions of a total of 15,000,000 men. 

We were received at the flagship and were taken aboard some of the 
other ships. On the Orion we were shown the operations of a battleship 
in a fight. We crawled under the turret where the two fifteen-inch guns 
were operated, and witnessed the loading and firing operation. We watched 
the operations of the ship and guns from the bridge, and went down into 
the engine room to see the two great steam turbines. We visited the mess 
where the men were eating, and the officers' quarters. At noon we divided 
into parties of four or five, each party going to a separate ship for luncheon. 

In the afternoon we were taken to see the American squadron. It was 
an inspiration to see that the great battleships, sailing under the Stars and 
Stripes, compared favorably with the English. They were seemingly as 
well equipped and as powerful as any of the English ships. Our squadron 
comprised battleships, cruisers and submarine chasers and destroyers. 

Devastation — 

The contrast between the two aspects of war, that on the sea and that on 
the land, was brought vividly before us when we arrived in battle-torn 
France. Here, with the Great Fleet, was the manifestation of power, 
might, and supremacy in war. There it was a struggle, destruction and 
suffering. During our trip through the devastated area we were constantly 
depressed by the indescribable pathos and horror of the scenes through 
which we passed. 

Every arrangement had been made for our party to make the trip from 
London to France in a large Handley-Page flying machine. This was one 
of the things that had been constructed for the especial purpose of bombing 
Berlin, and was capable of carrying, as far as weight is concerned, forty to 
fifty people. The machine was taken out and every preparation was made 
for the flight, but at the last moment the famous London fog deprived us 

60 




I a 



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I\ the Wake of War 

of this great privilege, and in order to keep the schedule we were forced to 
take the boat across the Channel to Boulogne. We arrived in the evening 
and were taken by motor to the English Guest House, situated some thirty 
miles from the Front, the Chateau Radinghem, which had not been occupied 
for many years, but which had been fitted up by the English as a place 
to entertain visitors to the Front. 

The Chateau is typical of many in France, dating back to about the 
seventeenth century. It was built as a place of residence, but was also 
provided with the usual means of defense, and surrounded by a moat with 
the usual drawbridge. It was furnished by the British officers in strictly 
military style, the main living room being decorated with trophies from 
the war. 

From this centre, for three days, we motored to the various points of the 
devastated area, returning each night to the welcome fireplaces of the 
Chateau. Each day we motored from 150 to 175 miles, taking with us our 
luncheon, consisting of bread and wine, which we ate usually standing by 
the side of the cars in some devastated village. 

La Bassee to Ypres — 

Our first trip by motor was through the city of La Bassee to Lille, Menin 
and across the Belgian front as far as Ypres. La Bassee now is simply a mass 
of fallen buildings. Hardly a wall remains standing from one end of the 
town to the other. The road to Lille runs through a region a thousand 
times more desolate than the Sahara. The fields are a mass of shell holes. 
The road is the only thing that is intact, and this is true only because it was 
being repaired continuously during the war. Rows of tall trees usually 
bordered the roads in France, and along these, wherever they were left 
standing, were hung screens to conceal the passage of marching troops. 
But more often the trees were completely shot away and nothing but the 
splintered trunks were left. 

Surrounded by these scenes of desolation we were surprised to find that 
the city of Lille was not shot to pieces like the other towns through which 
we passed. Most of the buildings were standing intact, although the fac- 
tories and houses had been looted and marred. It seemed like an isolated 
village, an oasis in a desert of destruction. We saw here the German money 
made in France. It was made of iron and was economized in size to that 
of a five-dollar gold piece. 

The Belgian town of Gheluvelt was once a scene of great fighting. Here 
the trenches extended for miles in every direction from the roadway, and the 
space between them was a mass of barbed wire entanglement. This place 

61 



American Journalists in Europe 

is in the eight-mile stretch between Menin and Ypres, and marks the scene 
of over 500,000 British casualties. Just east of Ypres is the point which 
will pass down in history as Hell Fire Crossing. It is nothing but a cross 
road and the scattered debris of farm buildings, but it was the scene of 
terrific lighting during the war. Ypres is a mass of ruins, and the beautiful 
Cloth Hall and the Cathedral are practically destroyed. 

Looking out toward the German front beyond this point, one sees a 
scene of desolation which beggars description. The ground is completely 
shell-marked, and one shell hole extends into another so that you have to 
pick your way from point to point. Scattered over this bit of No Man's 
Land were fifty to a hundred abandoned tanks, relics of the war, disabled 
and having the appearance of wrecked ships stranded on a deserted shore. 
Even the dead were not sufficiently buried and projections of bodies added 
a gruesomeness to the scene. We motored on and for miles and miles all 
the small towns we passed were either completely destroyed or deserted. 
The day's journey was through such scenes of desolation — the screened 
roads, the destroyed villages, and the returning troops — and what was once 
a fertile section was now worse than desolate waste, torn and riddled. We 
met and passed numerous troops, first a regiment of French, then a regi- 
ment of English, returning from the front, and we saw miles and miles of 
heavy artillery trains, eight-inch guns drawn by caterpillar tractors. 

Arras and Douai — 

At Arras, which was the farthest point west reached by the boche, the 
great cathedral is a mass of ruins and tottering walls. It is proposed to keep 
this great cathedral in its present ruined state. We visited the cellars 
which surround the city. They are excavations which were made in 
building the city, but in these cellars 60,000 men were hidden the day before 
the great drive when the Hun was driven back. Motoring east from Arras 
we crossed the great British defense line where trench after trench blocked 
the progress of the boche. The road to Douai is one continuous line of 
shell-holed fields and trenches, strewn with shells and the wreckage of war. 
We met here an English artillery train, returning from the front, consisting 
of fifty to 100 cannon, of all sizes up to the very largest, drawn by steam 
lorries. 

Douai presented a horrible picture of boche vandalism. A city of some 
15,000, it was completely sacked, and the homes of the people vandalized. 
We were taken to the home of Paul Bobant, who was once one of the wealthy 
and cultured gentlemen of Douai. He was a man of about sixty and was 
made head of the Bed Cross work in Douai during the war. While the 

62 



In the Wake of War 

Germans occupied the city he still continued the Red Cross work for the 
Germans. The Red Cross officers lived in his beautiful house. Six hours 
before the Germans retreated, they notified him that he must leave the city. 
Then, before they left, they destroyed everything in his home, ripped the 
pictures from the frames, smashed the furniture, hacked with sabres the 
carved tables. Chairs covered with tapestry were ripped and torn and 
smashed. The beautiful library containing books of art and value were 
strewn on the floor and torn and spoiled. Even the ceilings and sidewalls 
of the rooms had been smashed through with the butts of bayonets, and 
everything in this beautiful home, even to the personal clothing of the owner, 
was destroyed. The only things left in the house which were not destroyed 
were a crucifix under which was suspended the badge of the Legion of Honor, 
which had been presented to M. Robant, and the mirrors. These items 
seem to have had a superstitious influence on the beast. 

Rut not only was this beautiful home destroyed, but all others, and the 
stores were vandalized. The city is dead. The returning inhabitants wan- 
der through the streets as in a daze. The streets are solemn in their deso- 
lation. We saw a priest who stopped to tell us of the sacrileges of his altar 
and the profanation of his sacred vestments. He told of a village nearby 
in which the barbarism of the Hun still went on even after the armistice was 
signed. In one place they caused all the women to walk the streets naked, 
and all the barbarities possible were committed. 

From Douai through Lens to Vimy Ridge is the great coal section, and 
was once a continuation of mining villages, but this section also is now 
completely destroyed. The road winds through places where the debris 
has been shoveled out, presenting the appearance of a canal. Some villages 
are so nearly obliterated that a placard is posted among the ruins with the 
inscription, "This is the village of Souchez." 

Vimy Ridge was the most impressive spectacle of the great contest. 
It is covered now with shell holes and trenches. The trenches are almost 
lost in the maze of holes and mines which eat into them at every point, and 
among which one sees now only the rude markings of the graves and the 
rubbish of war. Dugouts had been constructed with heavy concrete covers. 
One mine hole is fully thirty to fifty feet deep and sixty to 100 feet across. 
This point will remain for years as evidence of the magnitude and violence 
of the great struggle. One sees few people here, and not a soul on Vimy 
Ridge, and no work being done except the repair of the roads and the return 
of Rritish troops, consisting of artillery trucks, vans, cavalry and general 
munitions. In the top of the Ridge is a hastily constructed monument 
dedicated to the brave Canadians who here paid the full price in their 

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American Journalists in Europe 

attempts to take the Ridge. Here had been the great mine, worked by 
the Welshmen under the Ridge when occupied by the Germans, the explosion 
of which was said to have been heard by Lloyd George in London. 

The Hindenburg Line — 

Our third day at the British front was spent in Bapaume, Cambrai and 
the Hindenburg line. Bapaume is among the cities of the dead. In the 
ruins of what was formerly a bank we picked up a propaganda sheet dis- 
tributed among the English and French, giving evidence of terrible German 
crimes. After lunching, standing among the ruins, we started for Cambrai, 
but owing to delays, our trip was terminated at the Hindenburg line. Here 
we saw the great underground German defenses. The trenches were ten 
to twelve feet deep, and leading from the bottom, usually at an angle, were 
the descents to the underground rooms. These rooms were thirty or more 
feet underground and were connected to other passages and out to the main 
zigzag trenches, and all were duplicated in irregular underground trench 
work leading back to the rear. These rooms were below the reach of shells 
and heavy artillery, but we saw the paths where the tanks had walked over 
the trenches and the wire obstructions as though they had not existed. 

Those three days will always remain the epitome of our semi-wartime 
experience. But for the armistice we should have hidden in the trenches 
and taken periscopic peeps at the great panorama of war; or possibly looked 
down on the processes of devastation from some of the aerial appurtenances. 
The booming of the great guns would have been still ringing in our ears, 
and the spectacle of advancing forces and aerial combat would have formed 
a never-to-be-forgotten kaleidoscope of carnage. 

Yet the swift passage of our motor cars through mud and rain, the en- 
counter of endless, returning armies, and the horrors of the devastated war 
zone, have given us at least the atmosphere of the great contest. 

Our Letter to President Wilson — 

So it was while seated around the fire at Chateau Badinghem recounting 
the horrors of our inspection that we were stirred to action and a com- 
mittee was appointed to draft a letter to our President, insisting that he and 
others of our countrymen should see what we had seen before determining 
the basis of future relations with those who were directly responsible for 
bringing this great suffering to intelligent humanity. The following letter 
was therefore sent to President Wilson and printed in the leading papers 
of Europe and America : 

64 



In the Wake of War 

"Dear Mr. President: 

"The undersigned American citizens address you to further the sacred cause of human 
justice and right. 

"For days we have been passing over the battlefields and through ruined cities and 
obliterated villages of Belgium and France. We are among the first American civilians to 
survey this area of desolation, and we have been profoundly moved. 

"The devastation and ruin wrought are not the work of one man or a group of men. 
They are the result of a system, the policies of which have been executed with thorough- 
ness by a willing people. The evidences of organized pillage and vandalism are on 
every hand. 

"E\ ery law presupposes a penalty for its violation. The laws of nations that civiliza- 
tion has so painfully built up through the centuries have been wantonly isolated for four 
long years. To fail to enforce those laws now would be tacitly to concede the power of re- 
peal by the criminals themselves. These laws must be re-established. To our mind 
the enforcement of complete restitution and reparation by the people of Germany and the 
punishment of the leaders and their guilty agents for the crime committed in violation of 
existing laws against piracy, murder, and pillage, will do more than anything else could to 
ensure that future laws made by agreement of the nations will be observed. 

"We are writing this to you, knowing that the sentiments expressed would receive the 
support of all Americans, could they see these things as we have seen them and hear the 
terrible evidence from the lips of the unhappy victims." (Signed) Henry G. Lord, Boston 
Boger W. Allen, New York; Arthur J. Baldwin, New York; H. M. Swetland, New York 
Samuel 0. Dunn, Chicago; Herbert L. Aldrich, New York; H. Cole Estep, Cleveland 
Harry E. Taylor, New York; Edward H. Darville, New York; Howard C. Parmelee, New 
York; Frederic F. Cutler, Boston. 

The French Front — 

Visits to the French and the American fronts were made from our head- 
quarters in Paris, and were interspersed with social, industrial and sight- 
seeing events which lessened the depression of our trips to No Man's Land. 
We were met at the depot and taken to the Hotel Grand by members of 
the British Ministry and others who were arranging our program. Lord 
Castleross insisted that we dine with him at the famous Voisin, and wines of 
rare vintage were mostly wasted on unaccustomed palates. We visted the 
Andre Citroen plant, the tomb of Napoleon, Versailles, and were dined at 
the Inter-Allied Club, which occupied the home of Baron Bothschild. 

We were divided into two parties in alternately visiting the French and 
American salients. The French front was reached at Noyon, which was 
completely destroyed. Twenty-five per cent of the resident population 
consisted of an elderly lady who had remained throughout the entire bom- 
bardment, a baker and his two German-prisoner assistants, and an old 
blacksmith, vitriolic in his denunciation of German treatment. The party 
was then taken by railroad through Chateau-Thierry to Epernay and 
thence north to Bheims. 

65 



American Journalists in Europe 

At Chateau-Thierry, distant perhaps 2,000 yards, was the low range of 
hills taken by the Germans in their advancing rush. Here the French 
line was broken, and there were no troops back in reserve. There was an 
open road to Paris. But the American troops were there. We saw where 
the trainloads of American boys pulled in at the foot of these hills, jumped 
from the cars, formed ranks and charged up the hill. Line after line was 
mowed down, but the Marines and the Twenty-sixth Division kept coming 
until the hill was taken, the Germans driven back, and the drive for Paris 
ended. The evidences of battle are few. No elaborate trenches, no dug- 
outs, not much evidence of heavy shelling, but the struggle was one of 
terrific open warfare of a kind the Huns were not used to. 

Rheims — 

The famous cathedral at Rheims is a tragic ruin, but not beyond restora- 
tion. The roof is full of holes, the windows are smashed, and shell holes 
through the sides testify to the accuracy of the German gun fire. The fight- 
ing around Rheims was terrific, but the Germans never got in. Our party 
visited the celebrated champagne caves of Pommery, extending in tunnels 
and galleries for twelve miles under the city. These were connected with 
other cellars, so that they formed a complete system of communication 
under the city, accommodating many thousands of troops which could be 
moved from place to place in perfect safety from bombardment. These 
wine caves are old chalk tunnels, and there are many vaulted chambers and 
high galleries. We were told there were 8,000,000 bottles of champagne 
in the Pommery caves alone. 

At Berry-au-bac nearby where the German line held for four years, their 
system of underground dugouts connected by tunnels was extraordinary. 
We saw them just as they had been left in their hasty retreat. Taking 
hold of hands and led by a French officer who had been in the fighting when 
the position was captured, we groped our way by the light of an electric 
hand torch through many of these underground chambers. Some of them 
were well furnished with beds, chairs, rugs and pictures. The headquarters 
of the King of Saxony contained a handsome tiled fireplace and mantel, 
writing desk and all the furnishings of a comfortable living room thirty feet 
underground. 

The American Front — 

From the French front the party was taken to the American head- 
quarters at Chaumont and then on to Neufchateau, where guests were 
quartered in a comfortable house in charge of American officers. From this 

66 



In the Wake of War 

point we visited Toul. Beaumont, Seieheprey, St. Mihiel, Verdun, and Metz, 
many of them scenes of terrific French and American fighting. The country 
in this sector is different from the north. It is beautiful, hilly, partially 
wooded land, affording strong defensive positions. We passed the American 
position, and following the course of the St. Mihiel salient, saw where the 
Americans had gone through. The Germans held a wonderfully firm posi- 
tion which had to be abandoned when they were outflanked. 

Mont Sec commands the country for miles. The French lost 60,000 
men in trying to take it by assault. It seemed impregnable, but it was cut 
off when the Allies drove through the base of the salient. St. Mihiel itself 
is little damaged, but the Germans, during their occupancy, concluded 
that the country already belonged to them and had built a big cemetery with 
fine monuments. 

1 erdun — 

The battlefield of Verdun carries its own story of the tremendous struggle 
which makes it the most famous of the great war. We visited it on a beauti- 
ful clear December day — we could see from Fort Vaux and other hills the 
whole great panorama, Douamont, Souville, Fleury, Dead Man's Hill, and 
all the rest. Every tree of the dense wooded hills has been shot away; 
every foot of ground churned up with shell holes; the hillsides covered like 
hideous lace work with trench lines and parapets which show white in the 
chalky soil. The hills on which the battle was fought are several miles 
from the city and almost entirely surround it, forming a wonderfully strong 
position for defense. The Germans surrounded Verdun on two-thirds of 
the circle. The town has little strategic value, and as it could only be 
reached by German heavy guns, they evidently preferred to reserve these 
for the fortifications. The Citadel in the outskirts of the town is largely 
built under a hillside with galleries and chambers accommodating 
12,000 troops. We were shown through it and saw General Petain's 
headquarters. 

Metz— 

We visited Toul, Pont-a-Mousson and Metz, from which we motored 
back to Fleury and Seieheprey, where the Germans captured the first Ameri- 
can prisoners. We saw the great airdromes and many miles of American 
front. But Metz was the great objective of the day. It was not destroyed 
as were the other places, and in celebration of the victory the French flag 
was displayed everywhere, with an occasional sprinkling of the Stars and 
Stripes and the flag of Alsace-Lorraine. 

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American Journalists in Europe 

The great cathedral in the center of the city is adorned with statues 
of the saints along the front. One on the extreme right was known as the 
Prophet Daniel, but the Kaiser, in order to perpetuate his name among 
the saints, had caused the head of this statue to be removed and a cast of 
his own head to take its place. This is very apparent, even to the turned - 
up mustaches, but the French, on occupying Metz, have added a chapter to 
the history of the statue; they have placed great iron chains around the 
hands. Attached to the chain is a poster reading: "Stc transit gloria mundi." 
We also saw the overturned statue of Frederick III. This is a beautiful 
equestrian statue, but in the overturning the head of the rider struck the 
stone coping and is broken off. It was said that it is the intention of Metz 
to leave this overturned statue in its present condition for all time as a 
demonstration of the overthrow of German rule in Alsace-Lorraine. 

Civilization to go on — ■ 

These scenes of destruction and devastation, coupled with an observa- 
tion of the destructive machinery and operation of war, will remain the 
great object lesson of our journey. We are not attempting a historical 
notation or any adequate pen picture of these devastated areas. The brief 
memoranda of what was presented to our view gives but the merest hint of 
what occurred. No previous battlefield has been ploughed and tortured by 
the tremendous war machinery which characterized this conflict. For years 
the inventive genius of the world was centered on machinery of destruction. 
The denouement was stupendous. It rocked the civilization of the world. 
But the suffering inflicted on the whole world as a result of this effort must 
be impressed on future generations as the guiding star to universal and 
perpetual peace. Unless our civilization is to give place to savagery the 
destructive process must be eliminated. 

The American engineers who followed us to confer with the engineers of 
France, through their Chairman, Mr. Nelson P. Lewis of New York, give 
the following as their most conservative estimate: 

Devastated area, 6,000 square miles, 2,000,000 population. 

Five hundred thousand buildings damaged, one-half wholly destroyed. 

Buildings damaged or destroyed $4,000,000,000 

Furniture destroyed or stolen 1,000,000,000 

Public works 2,000,000,000 

Farm lands 800,000,000 

Live stock, agricultural implements and forests 1,200,000,000 

Mines and steel works 700,000,000 

Miscellaneous industrial plants, machinery and raw materials 4,000,000,000 

Tolal $13,700,000,000 

68 



■t£I~. r^ " 




CAPT. EDDIE RICKENBACKER. AMERICAN ACE OF ACES. WITH HIS SPAD PLANE 




-MOTORS ON DOCKS AT BORDEAUX 







RENAULT TANKS AT FACTORY AWAITING TESTS 




GERMAN PILL BOX ALONG MENIN ROAD NEAR YPRES 




MACHINE ('.UN I 'oSITIi )N AI.oNC. A HIGHWAY 




GERMAN PRISONERS BEING MARCHED THROUGH YI'RES AFTER THE GREAT ATTACK 




SEICHEPREY— SCENE OF THE FIRST AMERICAN ACTION 




MONTFAUCON, ON AMERICAN FRONT, TOTALLY DESTROYED 




IX THE WAKE OF THE GERMANS ON THE AMERICAN FRONT 



i 




TYPICAL COMMUNICATING TRENCH ON THE AMERICAN FRONT 




l«« i :.V-?.>J : i.-i- \J" V 

DESTROYED CHURCH SHOWING SIDE FACING GERMAN DINES 




SHELD DESTRUCTION ON AMERICAN FRONT 




BEHIND THE AMERICAN LINES ON THE ST. MIHIEL SECTOR 




DESTROYED CHURCH ON AMERICAN FRONT 




BRITISH REST DUGOUTS 




ARTILLERY MOVING UP PASSING A MINE CRATER IN FRONT OP WARLINCOURT 




THE RUINED VILLAGE OF COURCELETTE 




DESTROYED TRENCH SYSTEM IN CHAMPAGNE 




TANKS AND PONTOONS GOING THROUGH BELLICOURT 




DEVASTATION ON SOMME BATTLEFIELD 




BELLENGLISE, IN THE HINDENBURG LINE— TYPICAL OF THOUSANDS OF VILLAGES 




BRITISH TANK BREAKING BARBED WIRE DEFENCES ON THE HINDENBURG LINE 




DESTROYED VILLAGE ON AMERICAN FRONT 




DUGOUT SYSTEM ON FRENCH FRONT AT VERDUN 




DEVASTATED FOREST ON SOMME FRONT 



~ f tr 




DUGOUT ENTRANCE ON FRENCH FRONT 




THE ROAD TO BAPAUME 




FIRST PICTURE TAKEN IN CAMBRAI THE MORNING THE GERMANS WERE DRIVEN OUT 




'! -3il 







' 






•*•£*£ ■- '.. ' '*->:';.'- 



^ : ^r ; ^_ 




DEVASTATED VILLAGE IN SOMJIE BATTLE ZONE 




DESTROYED CARAVAN OF GERMAN WAR TRUCKS 




WESTWARD BOUND— V 



N our return to Paris we were again entertained at the Inter- 
national Club by the business men of Paris, and a strong 
feeling was established that the industries of both America 
and France could be benefited by a closer interchange of 
purpose and understanding. We are only able to reproduce the speech 
given by our Mr. S. 0. Dunn on this occasion. He replied as follows: 

It is my pleasant duty to say a word of appreciation on behalf of our party regarding 
the hospitality which we have received from the French Government and the French people 
during the brief time we have been in your country, and especially regarding the hospital- 
ity which you have extended to us tonight. 

We have now been on French soil for several days. We have traversed a large part 
of the territory of France which has been devastated in this cruel war. We have heard 
and we have seen the evidence of what the French nation has suffered, and of what it has 
done, not merely for itself, but for humanity, in this war. The more we have seen, the more 
gratification we, as American citizens, have felt that our country finally entered this great 
conflict and helped to bring it to a conclusion which was right and just. This was not the 
first time when Frenchmen and Americans had fought in the same cause. We could never 
forget and we have never forgotten that almost a century and a half ago when our fore- 
fathers were struggling for freedom from a German king who at that time occupied the 
British throne, the French people came to the assistance of our forefathers when assistance 
was vitally needed. Every student of history now knows that a majority of the British 
people did not, even at that time, approve of what their German king did and attempted 
to do. Certainly no Britisher approves of it now. It has therefore caused us much grati- 
fication to have our men and our ships serve side by side with the men and the ships of 
Great Britain. But possibly we have felt even more gratification because our ships and 
our men have fought side by side with those of France, because this has given our people 
an opportunity to repay in some measure the obligation of gratitude which they have 
owed to the French people for these many years. 

Permit me to endorse in conclusion what already has been said here tonight regarding 
the affection and admiration in which the people of the United States hold the people of 
France. Our people at home have but a vague and inadequate appreciation of what you 
have suffered and of what you have done, but even the vague and inadequate appreciation 
they have inspires in them sentiments which should help to insure the closest and most 
friendly relations between the United States and France for generations to come. 

69 



American Journalists in Europe 

Wilson in Paris — 

We witnessed the spirited ovation given to President Wilson on his 
arrival in Paris, equaling the peace day celebration which we witnessed 
in London. The streets swarmed with surging crowds shouting "Vive 
Wilson." He was courteous enough in his public acknowledgment of this 
reception to consider this as a welcome to his country. 

Leaving Paris by the morning train we missed the Channel steamer at 
Boulogne on a beautiful day. We remained all night, and experienced the 
worst day of the season in crossing the Channel next day. The boat was 
crowded to the limit with returning soldiers, but the storm was no respecter 
of uniforms, and their sufferings paralleled our own in the two-hour jour- 
ney across the Channel. 

On the nineteenth, the British Ministry gave us a final luncheon at The 
Savoy. Major Budge presided, and paid many compliments to our 
party. The following notice of the meeting appeared in the London 
Times of December 24, 1918: 

ANGLO-AMERICAN FRIENDSHIP 

U. S. Journalists' Farewell Messages 

The representatives of American trade journals, who came here at the 
invitation of the Ministry of Information to see England under war condi- 
tions and to visit the front, have sailed for home. At the close of their 
visit, which, fortunately, coincided with the signing of the armistice, and 
thus enabled them to see both England and France under happier conditions 
than could have been expected when they left America, they forwarded 
messages of thanks and good will, extracts from which are given below : — 

Mr. Henry G. Lord, Editor, Textile World Journal. — Until the return to 
more normal conditions permits greater freedom of travel, the people in both 
our countries must be dependent on the Press for a proper understanding of 
accomplishments and conditions, although only by personal observation 
can the facts be fully appreciated. This opportunity we have had, and with 
it goes the responsibility of telling the things we have seen, and conveying 
the impressions we have received to the business constituencies which we 
represent. If this is faithfully done, our friends must share with us the 
sincere desire for the best possible understanding and most cordial relations 
between the great English-speaking countries. 

Mr. H. Cole Estep, Editor, Iron Trade Review. — -Here in England and 
Scotland I have been most strongly impressed with the evidence on every 
side of your tremendous industrial resources and manufacturing capacity, 

70 



Westward Bound 

as well as with your organizing ability. There are many features in your 
productive enterprises that our people in the United States could study with 
profit. The English-speaking peoples should strive to work together 
harmoniously, with a full appreciation of each other's problems, and with a 
firm determination to place the business intercourse of the future on such a 
basis of integrity and fair dealing as will preclude forever the possibility of 
commercial friction leading to armed conflict. 

Mr. H. M. Swetland, President, United Publishers' Corporation. — We 
have witnessed the grandeur and strength of your time-honoured institu- 
tions. We have the evidence of your power to reconstruct and organize 
with patient courage and hopeful determination. A closer and more inti- 
mate knowledge, coupled with reasonable charity for our mutual eccentrici- 
ties, will greatly assist us to avoid personal and national disagreements. 

Mr. A. J. Baldwin, President, Associated Business Papers. — I return to 
America with a fuller realization of the gigantic problems with which Great 
Britain has grappled during these dark years and a better understanding 
of the spirit and purpose of your wonderful nation. 

Mr. E. H. Darville, Editor, Hardware Age. — I have long believed that 
with the British Empire and the United States cordially and unselfishly 
cooperating they can with their Armies and Navies exercise a wise restrain- 
ing influence on selfish dynastic ambitions for the best interests of mankind. 

In addition to these tributes from representatives of trade journals, Mr. 
William B. Moody, of the Record of Christian Work, says: — The members 
of our party have been impressed by the breadth of vision of men on this 
side of the ocean, and we return home inspired by something of their noble 
ideals. We shall work to bring about a better understanding of the prob- 
lems of the British Empire in the realization that they are the problems 
of civilized countries in which the United States should assume its respon- 
sibility, and render its quota of service. 

Departure — 

At nine A.M. on the twentieth of December we were at the depot, ready 
to bid a final farewell to London. We arrived at Liverpool at seven P.M., 
and were taken to probably the finest hotel in Europe, The Midland- 
Adelphia. It is the first hotel which has seemed like home. It is under- 
stood to have been built for Americans. In any case, it has steam heat, 
big lounging rooms, bathrooms, etc. The Major gave us a last private 
dinner, at which we attempted to express our appreciation of his careful 
attention to our party since its arrival, and the many services which he had 
rendered to the party, collectively and individually. 

71 



American Journalists in Europe 

By noon of the twenty-first we were on board the Carmania, a larger 
ship than the Lapland, and with better accommodations. We had to wait 
for the tide, and did not leave the pier until eleven A.M. the following day. 

The sea was calm as our pilot left us. But the nightmare of our pre- 
vious trip was still with us, for we were ordered to wear our lifebelts, as the 
danger of floating mines still existed. 

Christmas night on board was made enjoyable by a splendid concert 
and a lecture by Sir Arthur Pearson, the great English publisher, and 
founder of Dunstan School for the Blind. He explained to us in de- 
tail the great work which he has undertaken. Being blind himself, 
his speech was very impressive. He told us how they first get the con- 
fidence of the men, and get them to feel that while they may have 
lost one sense they have four left. His main talk hinged around the foun- 
dation of the school. They teach them to get about first in their own room, 
then they branch out, and soon they find that they can get on very com- 
fortably, although they cannot see. They are taught all sorts of work, 
from chair-making to stenography, and, as Sir Arthur explained, they make 
splendid workers, for their attention is not distracted by the things which 
they cannot see. 

Halifax — 

At Halifax we left 3,600 Canadian soldiers. We had enjoyed meeting 
and knowing many Canadian officers. They were going home. We were 
pleased at what Canada is doing for her men. We found that each of 
these officers had been presented with a big farm — not an unproductive 
waste of mountain stretches of snow and ice, but of productive land 
which can add to the productive capacity of Canada. And as a 
stimulation to these men to become solid and substantial citizens 
of the Colony, each one has the offer of a loan of $2,500 from the Canadian 
Government, at five per cent for five years, with which to equip, furnish 
and habilitate himself in his new home. 

We travelled around in the snow in Halifax, visiting the great pier which 
will cost $30,000,000, met the constructing engineer, and visited various 
parts of this wonderful undertaking, which is now under construction. 

Early in the afternoon we were on the way to New York, and January 
first we hailed with delight, first the grey Jersey shore, then Coney Island 
came into view, above which finally the Statue of Liberty lifted its head, 
and we were greeted with the ragged sky-line of old New York. But what- 
ever may be said in criticism of this conglomeration of architecture, it pre- 
sented to us the most beautiful picture we had seen since we left. 



& 



Westward Bound 

Looking Backward — 

Reviewing briefly the various experiences of what has been styled our 
great "adventure," our party found themselves tremendously impressed 
with the immensity of the great war struggle. The enormous jireparations 
made by the United States, the great merchant fleet on which we sailed, 
the concentrated intensity of English endeavor, and the determined and 
methodical work of the French people, proved that the greater part of the 
civilized world were united in one common cause, the protection and 
maintenance of such civilization as had been established prior to the war. 
We were impressed with the character and stability of English production 
even under its greatest expansion. The habit of quality production inau- 
gurated and maintained through many years permeated the war products 
in the same characteristic quality. But the greatest educational advan- 
tage gained from the trip was derived from close contact with the insti- 
tutions of England. The great docks at Liverpool, the Great Fleet, and 
the Bank of England illustrated the difference between the institutional 
progress of England, and the hasty and sometimes immature develop- 
ments of American enterprise. 

Whatever the inspiration which prompted Lord Beaverbrook to estab- 
lish his Ministry, and inaugurate through its ministrations a closer relation- 
ship between the nations of the world, can only be reflected in the results 
that are shown as a direct outcome of this undertaking. We can assure 
him, fifteen men have become thoroughly convinced of the wisdom of the 
project, and see a far-reaching development as a direct result of their visit. 
If the results are to be measured by the interest shown by the American 
people, a satisfactory answer can already be given. Numerous addresses 
before important and influential gatherings have been received with marked 
attention, and the pages of their various publications devoted to records 
of these important events have been read with great interest. 

Looking Forward — 

If the project measures up in any degree to the conception of its origi- 
nators, it will stand as the forerunner of many important and beneficial 
developments affecting the future of the people of the English-speaking 
nations. While the effort cannot produce that extreme personal relation- 
ship between all the individuals of the great nations represented, it is a 
beginning which promises much for future generations. As each country 
becomes better informed of the aims, objects and desires of the other 
a greater unity of purpose will be established, and civilization will 
mark a period of development. 

73 



American Journalists in Europe 

The business of the nations is to produce by industry and cooperation 
the commodities needed for the world. It is not a vain hope nor a wild 
assumption that a wider observation of the facilities, conditions and 
requirements of the several nations will bring about a cooperative effort 
which will furnish these commodities on a fair basis of exchange. No 
individual or collective plan will succeed that does not take into account 
a fair compensation for services rendered, whether it be from capital 
or labor. A careful consideration of these questions by our great 
statesmen will also tend to a closer study of conditions by the great leaders 
of industry representing both capital and labor. Society is interested in 
making better people. Industry is interested in making better products. 
But better products are a by-product of better people. Progress will, 
therefore, be at all times dependent upon the ethical stimulation of the 
people. Then the problem will be the intelligent organization of the pro- 
ductive capacity of the world, and the stimulation of production to its 
highest efficiency. The distribution of the products of individual industry 
will cease to be the dominant question. When we have stimulated industry 
to its highest efficiency, proportional compensation will follow. Civiliza- 
tion is today possessed of sufficient intelligence on the one hand, and suffi- 
cient humanity on the other, to answer properly and justly the question of 
the distribution of the products of all industrial endeavor. It may not be 
considered a prophecy but rather a conclusion from the progress of events 
that the culmination of advanced social, industrial and political conditions 
is within the intellectual vision of advanced thought. Such a denouement 
will give the world a universal government, a common language and a 
distribution of world's products proportional to individual effort. 

To this end, the British Ministry of Information has made a liberal 
contribution, and the Industrial Press of America will assist as far as pos- 
sible the evolutionary process. 

Impressions — 

The foregoing is an effort to record in a more substantial manner than 
has been previously undertaken, the important events and happenings that 
occurred in this connection. It also offers an opportunity of placing on 
permanent record the great appreciation of our party, individually and 
collectively, of the many favors and courtesies extended, not only by the 
British Ministry of Information, but by a large number of individuals who 
cooperated in the project to our profit and pleasure. 

In the following pages an opportunity for individual expression by each 
member of the party has been afforded. 

74 




ARTHUR J. BALDWIN 



Is a graduate of Cornell University and member of the American 
Society of Mechanical Engineers. He entered the publishing 
business in 1916 as President of the Hill Publishing Co., and 
with the consolidation became Vice-President of the McGraw- 
Hill Company. Mr. Baldwin is an able lawyer, and is consid- 
ered a great acquisition to the publishing field. He was a mem- 
ber of the Constitution Convention of the State of Neiv York. 
He has given much time to politics and other patriotic ivork. 
He was the first President of the reconstructed Associated 
Busiiiess Papers, Inc.. which is at present an important organiza- 
tion, the members consisting of the leading publishers of busi- 
ness pa vers in Aim erica 




PERSONAL IMPRESSIONS— VI 

ENORMITY OF GERMAN CRIMES 
By Arthur J. Baldwin 

HE impressions that I received from our European trip were 
many and varied, but somehow, now that a number of months 
have passed since I traveled through the devastated area, one 
thing stands out predominantly in my mind, and that is the 
enormity of Germany's crimes. To express them tersely I would say they 
were three, and I would name them in the inverse order of their importance. 
FIRST — The Crime Against Property: The sight of the fertile lands 
made barren, the populous towns and cities laid waste, and villages literally 
obliterated, made a deep and lasting impression on my mind. Rut, after 
all, this great crime against property is of the least importance because we 
know that in time the flowers will again bloom, the trees will grow, and the 
industry of man will replace much of the wealth so wantonly destroyed. 

SECOND — The Crime Against Humanity: Ten million men are dead, 
and millions of young manhood of Europe, while they live, are sightless and 
maimed, and their vitality sadly depleted. Some statistician will shortly 
give us the exact numbers of these casualties but no one will ever be able 
to enumerate the broken hearts and blasted hopes, or measure the tears 
or the anguish of the years that have gone. This crime against humanity 
is felt in millions of homes, but somehow we realize that time, while it does 
not assuage the sorrow and suffering of the world, deadens the pain, and in a 
few generations the world will move on and the processes of evolution will, 
in a certain sense, replace the lost ones. 

THIRD — The Crime Against Civilization: By this I mean the destruc- 
tion of the moral fibre of mankind. Slowly through the generations there 
was evolved a code of honor applicable alike to all men in their dealings one 
with another. "Thou shaft not kill!" was taught for so many generations that 
the sanctity of human life seemed secure. "Thou shalt not steal!" was 
made the fundamental law of all governments and all peoples, until life and 
property were secure from pole to pole and westward until the globe was 
encircled. And woman, too, was respected, and those tender relations 

75 



American Journalists in Europe 

of life which are the very basis of civilization seemed secure everywhere. 
But in the autumn of 1914 Germany invaded Belgium, openly violated her 
treaties, and the world, with open eyes, wondered that there was no such 
thing as honor among nations. Men began to ask themselves, "If there is 
no honor among nations why should there be honor among men?" They 
saw so much killing and murder that it was put into the hearts of all men to 
kill. They saw so much pillage and robbery and appropriation under the 
guise of military necessity that the millions of men involved could draw 
but one lesson — if you want anything you must take it. The manner in 
which the womanhood of invaded France and Belgium was treated, and the 
utter disregard of established laws and morals furnished such an example 
to the world that there seemed to be precedents for anything that man 
desired to do. Civilization had been built up upon the restraints that were 
laid upon ignorance and passion. Germany loosened all these restrictions, 
and now, although peace is being sounded, there is approaching from 
eastern Europe and steadily making its way westward a theory of life and 
morals that knows no country and knows no God. The whole moral fabric 
of the world is so undermined and a hungry world is being fed upon the 
garbage can of Hell. Even in the streets of New York this day there are 
circulated pamphlets reading: "No more rent to the landlords! No more 
interest to the bankers! Property for the workers only! Are YOU for it?" 
Bolshevism, the expression of unrestrained desire and animalism, was 
made possible by Germany's conduct. This to me is Germany's greatest 
crime. Centuries upon centuries of work have been destroyed, and long 
after the property damage and damage to human life shall have been lost 
sight of, the moral fibre of civilization will still feel this terrible wrong. 



0&i 



76 




H. E. TAYLOR 



Graduated from Amherst College in 1904. Member of the City 
Club of New York. Entered the publishing business in 1906, 
and has been for a number of years secretary of the Textile 
Publishing Co., Eastern manager of the Root Newspaper 
Association, and Advertising Manager of the "Dry Goods 
Econotn ist" 



JUSTICE TO CIVILIZATION 

By Harry E. Taylor 

As I now look back over those eventful months of our trip the details 
have pretty generally classified themselves, but the general impressions are 
so closely interwoven as to be segregated only with difficulty. 

It is more plain each day that the British Government was wise in not 
relying upon printed propaganda to have itself properly understood by the 
world, but that its plan of inviting men from every corner of the earth to 
come and see will have a more far-reaching effect than any printed program 
that might have been issued. 

I shall never forget the sense of unworthiness and yet pride with which I 
first heard the men of the United Kingdom praise the part played in the war 
by this country, and express their sincere thanks and appreciation for having 
unquestionably thrown the balance against the Central Powers. I am 
constantly conscious of a sincere friendship towards this nation on the part 
of the English, the Scotch and the Irish, which friendship was to be found 
in all of the classes with which I came in contact. The extent of that feeling 
abroad is not known or realized in this country as it should be, but the 
knowledge of it is bound to spread by very reason of its existence. As 
things stand today I feel that Great Britain knows us better than our people 
know her. 

Before doing the battle area I was impressed with the fact that the 
British reserve had in it nothing of the phlegmatic. I was impressed with 
the almost inconceivable amount of effort expended in material accom- 
plishments; with the enormous drain on man power; with the stoic sacrifice 
of life, money and comfort; and with the great solidity and earnestness and 
determination of the British people. 

Having seen what we did of the fighting area we can still better appreciate 
what was that wastage of men and material and human effort. W astage, 
because it was all wasted beyond salvage for destructive purpose, or for 
defense against destruction. To me the one great thought as we saw the 
thousands of acres of barbed wire, the hundreds of miles of trench systems, 
the thousands of underground excavations, the hundreds of demolished 
tanks, and the evidence of infinite labor, and, as we easily imagined, millions 
of tons of steel manufactured and the extensive transport system required — 
seeing all this, it seemed a miracle of miracles that the Allies should have 
saved themselves from even the first rush of the Central Powers, so long 

77 



American Journalists in Europe 

prepared, so completely supplied and so carefully co-ordinated for this war. 
That the British people, with their enormous indebtedness, with the 
destruction of shipping, with their appalling loss of human life, face a great 
financial, social and economic problem, is immediately apparent to anyone. 
Particularly, in that external commercial relationships have been changed 
during the same time that internal changes were going on. I feel that it 
would be a great mistake if the moment the one great danger to the world 
were removed, international martial cooperation were to give way immedi- 
ately to international commercial competition and thereby place the heavi- 
est economic burdens upon those who had made the greatest sacrifice for the 
world's safety and future happiness. 

There is another impression which I shall carry as long as I live, and I 
think we all will. It is that impression of Douai. We shall remember 
Ypres, Lens, Courcelette, and the hundreds of other cities and villages, 
worse than obliterated by the terrific fighting that swept back and forth 
through them, but we shall remember that that destruction was a part of 
modern warfare. In contrast with them we shall remember Douai and that 
what we saw there is not the evidence of war but the unquestioned evidence 
of organized vandalism and bestiality for which those in authority were 
no more or less responsible than the individual private soldier. The wanton 
destruction, despoilment and defilement that was carried on in every room 
in every house in that town would have been impossible unless it were 
willingly and enthusiastically done by many thousands of individual Huns. 

And now that the war is over we are fully aware of what Germany 
intended to do to and with the nations she had planned to conquer, now that 
we have ourselves seen what she did to the inhabitants caught behind her 
lines, now that we have read her own printed plans for exacting recompense 
for her own expenses, now that we have seen the sacrifice of life, wealth and 
happiness forced upon civilized nations and peaceful human beings, it is 
galling to read peace plans and international policies that talk about "jus- 
tice" to Germany and Austria, and forget the justice due the inhabitants of 
Douai, or those farmers of Noyon, or the crucified Canadians, or the little 
French lieutenant so horribly burned with liquid fire, or the boys who were 
choked to death by gas, or those who died in agony from poisoned waters, 
despite the agreements of The Hague. I am in favor o£ justice to Germany 
and Austria ; but justice to civilization deserves first consideration, and such 
justice involves full and complete punishment for crimes committed and 
rendering of the criminal helpless to repeat. 

I feel that the great opportunity that was ours carried with it the per- 
petual obligation and privilege to promote truths and proper understandings. 

78 




ALLEN W. CLARK 



He entered the publishing business in 1SS8, and since 190S has 
been president of the American Paint Journal Co. of St. Louis, 
publishers of the "American Paint and Oil Dealer" and the 
"American Paint Journal". He is president of the Southwestern 
Trade Press Association and teas one of the founders of the 
Associated Business Papers, Inc. He was state chairman of the 
Committee on War Camp Activities of Missouri and was a 
member of the Export Bureau of the War Trade Board during 
the war. Mr. Clark was on leave of absence by courtesy of the 
War Trade Board while in Europe 



THE ENGLISH-SPEAKING DEMOCRACY 

By Allen W. Clark 

The common democracy that pervades the English-speaking world and 
that made us feel at home among Britishers of all degrees was most strik- 
ingly exemplified to me in the character of Baillie Muir, shoemaker, the 
official host who presided and spoke with such rare grace and wit and wisdom 
at the dinner given us by the corporation of Glasgow. When I told him 
of our St. Louis shoemakers and their great plants, he said, "But I'm a cob- 
bler and work at my bench," — which reminded me of the Mayor of St. 
Louis, who had said to me a few months before, at a Liberty Loan meeting 
in a high school building, "Eight years ago I was laying bricks in that south 
wall, and mashed my finger." 

It was an incident, of an instant, that most enlightened me, and removed 
my one prejudice against the English, whose native reserve I had considered 
an indifference or incapacity for feeling. It was on a crowded London 
street, when a bomb bursted in midair, then another, and I felt the instant 
tension of the crowd. Everyone had stopped in his tracks as if paralyzed. 
A third bomb exploded and though all knew its message the tenseness did not 
relax — until, after several seconds, a woman rushed into the street, with her 
arms opened toward the skies, and cried, "Thank God, it's over." Then 
and there the men and women and children, who a few hours later and for 
a week after, made pandemonium on the Strand, fell to weeping and sob- 
bing, some upon their knees — and were unashamed. Then I knew that the 
English are very human and very lovable and quite understandable. 

Perhaps the British characteristic most important for Americans to 
realize and appreciate was impressed upon me by almost daily demonstra- 
tions — but one incident illustrating it constantly recurs to me. In a little 
suburban settlement a small cottage was being torn down. It was said to 
have been built about 150 years ago — not old, for England. Every bit of 
wood in that cottage had been painted or varnished all over, on all sides and 
ends, the surfaces that were hidden as well as the surfaces that were shown ; 
and all this wood was practically intact. British thoroughness is a trait, 
a quality, an asset, of which the world will know more, if British manufac- 
turers continue their current emulation of American organization and quan- 
tity production and scientific advertising. 

Another incident comes to my mind when I am asked, "If the war 
devastation is as bad as it has been described," and I know that it never 



American Journalists in Europe 

has been described and never can be described satisfactorily by or to one who 
has not seen it. We were in a ruined and razed city in the midst of that 
vast devastated area through which we had motored for hours until its tragic 
monotony overwhelmed us into a sickness of heart that was silent in the 
futility of speech. The quiet of the grave covered the ruined city as a pall, 
and we seemed curious and alien intruders in this cemetery of homes and 
hopes, of industries and work, of churches and schools and hospitals and 
reverence and culture and charity. Here, and for miles around, was no 
habitation for man nor beast. Even the birds seem to shun its desolation 
and solitude. But up the narrow roadway that had been cleared through 
the debris for the Allies' last advance came a woman and four small chil- 
dren — one in her arms. She had eluded or cajoled countless military police 
and dragged herself and her children for miles through that zone of desola- 
tion, in her woman's and mother's insatiable hunger for the home that she 
must have known was but a shapeless mass of brick and timbers. 

But what impressed me most deeply of all was the idea and spirit and 
work of the English-Speaking Union, and I also am reminded of that by 
another incident. "Do any of you want to see anybody or any city in 
Ireland?" Major Evelyn Wrench, our official host, asked us. "Because 
we want you to go everywhere and to visit everybody that you have even 
the slightest inclination to see, and we can arrange that any such visit or 
interview can be secured without any embarrassment to anybody." 

Major Wrench was the prime factor in the conception and organization 
of the English-Speaking Union, of which he recently said, in a dinner to a 
distinguished American, Hon. James M. Beck: 

"Mr. Beck has referred to the Arthurian Legend as one of the greatest 
possessions we English-speaking people have in common. Why should not 
we create a Round Table to which we could call the Knights from all 
the far corners of the world, all the men who do things that are worth 
while in the English-speaking world? I should like to see this Parliament, 
this Conference, this Moot or Council, whatever you like to call it, meet 
one year in Washington to discuss common problems, and another year in 
London, subsequently at Melbourne or Sydney, at Ottawa and Cape Town, 
and let it perambulate around the English-speaking world. And if we could 
have such a common council as this, with representatives from all the Eng- 
lish-speaking world, it would have a tremendous influence, and would make 
us all understand the problems we have to face, and would be the means 
of teaching us a great deal. We of the English-speaking world have much 
to learn from one another. America has her tremendous lessons to teach 
us, and I venture to say that this old country has something to teach also." 

80 




H. C. ESTEP 



Attained the title M. E. from the University of Minnesota in 
190S. Is a member of the American Iron and Steel Institute, 
British Iron and Steel Institute, American Foundrymen's Asso- 
ciation and American Society of Mechanical Engineers. He 
entered the publishing business in litOS. Has been Directing 
Editor for the Penton Publishing Co., publishers of the "Iron 
Trade Review", ''Daily Iron Trade", "The Foundry", "The Marine 
Review" and "Power Boating" for 4 years. He is the author of 
"How Wooden Ships Are Built", was Secretary of the Semisteel 
Shell Committee, Ordnance Department, in 191S, and is at 
present Chairman and Secretary of the Committee on Papers 
for the American Foundrymen's Association 



IMPRESSIONS OF GREAT RRITAIN AND FRANCE AT 
THE END OF THE WAR 

By H. Cole Estep 

The period immediately following the signing of the armistice was 
described by A. J. Balfour, the great foreign secretary of Britain, as "the 
most dramatic moment in the history of recorded civilization." A jour- 
ney through western Europe at such a time could not help but bring to one's 
mind a multitude of tremendous and vivid impressions, only a few of which 
I shall endeavor to set down. 

On every hand in Europe, I am glad to say, there is the most generous 
disposition to give the United States credit, perhaps more than we deserve, 
for our part in the war. And it is particularly gratifying to know that this 
credit extends especially to the American private soldier — to our doughboys 
whom everyone freely admits were among the finest fighting men who ever 
appeared in battle in the world's history. 

The second great impression which I received is that Germany is utterly, 
completely and finally defeated in a decisive military way. And further- 
more the Germans know it regardless of any camouflage they may put up 
from time to time. Just before he departed for the safe security of Holland, 
the Crown Prince issued one of his characteristic flamboyant manifestoes to 
"my glorious, loyal and steadfast troops." With that curious inconsistency 
which is characteristic of the Germans, the Crown Prince in this document 
compliments his army on its victorious career and then points out how 
many of his divisions have been reduced to a strength of less than 1,000 rifles. 

If anything could add to Germany's military defeat you have only to 
consider the condition of her industries. The basis of all war today is steel. 
And Germany's source of steel is gone through the loss of the great Briey 
iron ore fields. These fields are the second most important in the world 
and the only ones in Europe where iron ore can be mined on a basis com- 
parable in cost and efficiency with our own Lake Superior ranges. Without 
this Briey ore the great German blast furnaces and steel works in the lower 
Rhine valley must remain black and deserted. And hereafter, let us not 
forget, Germany cannot obtain this essential raw material which lies at the 
root of her entire industrial and military power except on terms dictated 
by France and the League of Nations. 

My third impression of Europe concerns the great debt which we owe 
to our older Allies abroad, which we can never repay, owing to their terrific 
and terrible losses. 

81 



American Journalists in Europe 

In spite of this, however, I was amazed at the evidence on every hand, 
especially in Great Britain, of tremendous reservoirs of industrial and com- 
mercial power. The war has awakened the British people to new life and 
energy such as they have never exhibited before in all their great history. 
And as a result, I believe that England has come out of the war more power- 
ful in an industrial and business sense by far than she went into it. 

To make this definite, permit me to present a few figures regarding the 
British foundry industry with which I happen to be familiar. In Great 
Britain, that little country no larger hardly than the State of Wisconsin, 
there are 3,000 gray iron foundries, or about two-thirds as many as there 
are in all of the United States of America. These foundries have a capacity 
at present of about 2,000,000 tons of castings per year. In addition, there 
are about 100 steel foundries in Great Britain, with a capacity of 160,000 
tons per year, or double that which was available prior to the war. Finally, 
there are an equal number of malleable iron foundries with a capacity of 
over 50,000 tons per year. And Great Britain's iron and steel industry as 
a whole has increased its capacity some fifty per cent in the last four years, 
or from 8,000,000 to 12,000,000 tons per annum. 

Of course, back of all this evidence of power and prosperity stands 
labor, the great question-mark of the day in Great Britain. There are fav- 
orable factors, however, even in the British labor situation. Particularly 
one is impressed in going through British shops with the great advantage 
they have in the fact that their workmen come from a single national stock 
and all speak the same language. The practical importance of this is incal- 
culable and I have been vividly impressed with the fact that no movement 
among our industries today is more important than the plans which are 
going forward in many industrial centers for Americanizing our great un- 
digested mass of foreign-born workmen and teaching them the English 
language, so we will have a common bond of speech through the medium 
of which we can deal with these men. 

Stretching down across the fair land of France from the North Sea to the 
Swiss border is the great red line of battle now happily quiet, peaceful and 
all but deserted by fighting men. Nevertheless, you cannot take even one 
glance at a battlefield, viewing that vast welter of destruction, with here 
and there those lonely little crosses, without being filled with the determina- 
tion that somehow in a practical way — and it must be practical — a plan 
must be worked out which will prevent the world from ever again going 
through the scourge of the past four years. 



82 




HERBERT LINCOLN ALDRICH 



Was educated at Cornell University. Is a member of the En- 
gineers' Club, New York; Automobile Club of America, Loyal 
Legion, Army and Navy Club. Member of the Council Ameri- 
can Society of Naval Architects *£ Marine Engineers; member 
of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. In 1S97 he 
wrote a booh, "Arctic Alaska and Siberia". Assisted in the 
founding of Marine Engineering , and is President and Treasurer 
of the Aldrich Publishing Co., which publishes "Marine En- 
gineering", "The Boiler Maker" and technical books 



IMPRESSIONS FROM THE TRIP 
By H. L. Aldrich 

The trip was full of impressions — important and unimportant — but the 
important ones were so great in themselves that they make the unimportant 
ones seem trivial. Recause of this I shall devote myself entirely to the 
important ones. 

Nothing impressed me more than the apparent change in sentiment of 
the people of England toward Americans. On my many previous trips to 
England (and this was the twenty-third time I have crossed the Atlantic), 
I have been impressed with the consciousness that although some of the 
Rritishers were friendly to Americans, many of them were not. This time, 
however, all the weeks we spent there, so beautifully entertained by the 
nation, I do not recall meeting a man who did not seem anxious to be 
friendly with Americans and eager to have his country and ours in perfect 
accord. 

The feeling seemed to be universal that the future safety of the English- 
speaking peoples depended upon a spirit and bond of friendship that no 
German propaganda, nor other maligned influence, could break. 

In previous years I have visited English industrial establishments where 
I was entertained in the office with the greatest of courtesy and given good 
cigars to smoke, but was apparently deliberately kept away from the shops 
where work was carried on. This time where we were received in industrial 
establishments there seemed to be a desire to make us feel as though we were 
welcome, not only to enjoy the cigars and the wines in the offices, but to 
inspect the manner in which the work in the shops was being carried on. 

I expected to find in London many wrecked buildings and other evidences 
of destruction wrought by bombs dropped from German aeroplanes, and the 
surprise was great to find no such traces of demolition. It showed a wise 
forethought on the part of the English authorities, to have at once the 
damaged buildings restored, to efface all oppressing and disheartening signs 
of wreckage. 

I had the good fortune (if it could be called good) to be in London when 
the war started. It was wonderful to see the valiant way in which the young 
men, with such unhesitating and intrepid courage, rushed to enlist, and it 
was inspiring to witness the enthusiastic and indomitable spirit with which 
the people showed their determination to win the war into which they had 
been so unexpectedly plunged. Napoleon recognized this characteristic 

83 



American Journalists in Europe 

tenacity when someone said to him, "The British seldom win hattles." 
He answered, "But they always win the last one." 

The terrible price that the English and Scotch have paid to win the 
victory is more appalling than human imagination can picture, but the 
undaunted spirit with which they are greeting peace is as admirable as their 
irrepressible valor in tackling the war at its inception. 

France does not seem at all like her old self. Our lack of knowledge of 
the French language and of the French character made it difficult for us to 
comprehend all that the people are feeling about the terrible ordeal through 
which they have passed. But the same quality of mind and spirit which 
enabled them to meet so heroically privations, danger and death will carry 
them on progressively through the reconstruction period to the triumph of 
eventual prosperity. 

Naturally, as an American, I was deeply impressed by the evidences 
on all sides of the excellent work done by my fellow-Americans and in 
talking to scores of people I learned to realize how fearlessly our soldiers 
faced the fight and how brilliantly their final effort helped to bring about 
the armistice. 

Equally well did our doctors distinguish themselves in the work that 
they did. 

It especially touched my pride in engineering to see the work that our 
American engineers did in all branches of their work in France, and although 
I undoubtedly missed a great deal by not visiting Metz, Verdun, Rheims 
and other places, I would not for anything have missed the very remarkable 
experience I had in going to St. Nazaire, and seeing with my own eyes what 
our American engineers did to back up the work of the soldiers who did the 
fighting, and the doctors who were on the battle-front and who managed 
our hospitals so splendidly. St. Nazaire is a full day's ride from Paris and 
there was a constant changing of passengers so that I had opportunity to 
talk with something like seventy-five to 100 men closely associated with the 
work done by our engineers. In this way I was able to get an unusually 
intimate grasp of what these engineers had done. The work would make 
any American proud of the fact that he was an American citizen, and 
especially make a man associated with engineering proud of his associates. 



84 




SAMUEL O. DUNN 



He is a member of the Illinois Bar, American Economic Asso- 
ciation and the National Institute of Social Sciences. He en- 
tered the publishing business in 1890, and has been the Editor 
of "Raihvay Age" since 1911. He is the author of "The American 
Transportation Question", "Government Ownership of Rail- 
ways" and "Regulation of Railways". He is a noted writer for 
popular publications on railway subjects, and is on the lecture 
staff of the North Western University of Illinois, Howard Uni- 
versity and the University of California 



& 



WAR AND OPPORTUNITY 

By Samuel 0. Dunn 

I think the deepest impression made on my mind by what I saw in 
Europe was made by the evidence we saw on every hand of the destructive- 
ness of modern warfare. In all the regions where there had been prolonged 
hard fighting the ruin was complete. While we were passing through the 
devastated areas the question constantly arose in my mind as to where all 
the civilian population which had inhabited some of the fairest parts of Rel- 
gium and France had gone. The fact of its absence indicated more for- 
cibly than anything else could the terrible sufferings which I he survivors had 
endured and to which many thousands of persons had succumbed. 

The ruin wrought by the war was not, however, confined to the devas- 
tated areas. It had extended throughout the world, because the entire 
population of the world had been put under tribute, not merely tribute in 
money, but tribute in labor, suffering, property and lives to produce the 
results of which the desolation which we saw was merely the most concrete 
evidence. 

The ruin wrought by this war argues overwhelmingly, to my mind, for 
new constructive efforts being made to render war, if not impossible, at 
least far more improbable in the future than it has been in the past. Mea- 
sures are being proposed to make future wars less destructive and more 
humane. These are but palliatives, and may prove to be not even pallia- 
tives. I fear that any war which may occur when there are available such 
instruments of destruction as modern science has made available will have 
effects as bad. or worse, as this war, and that unless mankind can devise 
means of preventing wars civilization will be destroyed by the very science 
which it has regarded as one of its most glorious and beneficent products. 

Another impression made on my mind was as to how much more the 
peoples of Europe had done and suffered than had the people of the United 
States. We did our part during the short time we were in the war, but they 
did their part much longer and at much more frightful cost than we did. 
Those who held back the Germans during the two and a half years before 
we entered were defending us as much as themselves, although we did not 
then recognize it. In our future relations with them we should recognize 
this fact and deal with them accordingly. 

With respect to the American industries which the papers with which I 
am connected especially represent, I gained the impression that the outcome 

85 



American Journalists in Europe 

of the war has opened to them an enormous opportunity. The industries 
in large parts of Europe have been destroyed. The industries of Europe 
which have not been destroyed have greatly deteriorated, and the same 
thing is true of the industries of other countries throughout the world. The 
material welfare of mankind demands that industries which have deteriorat- 
ed shall be rehabilitated and that those that have been destroyed shall be 
reconstructed. It demands also that vast resources of the earth which 
heretofore have remained almost untouched shall be developed. 

Before these vast untouched resources can be developed or industries 
which have deteriorated can be rehabilitated, or industries which have been 
destroyed can be reconstructed, there must be carried out all over the world 
a vast program of rehabilitating and reconstructing old railroad systems 
and of building new ones. Production can not be maintained and enlarged 
under modern conditions without good and adequate railroad service to 
transport raw materials to the places of production and to carry the finished 
products away. 

Now, the one country which today possesses a large surplus capacity 
for the production of railway equipment and supplies is the United States. 
Furthermore, it is the one country which has large amounts of capital which 
can be devoted to the rehabilitation, reconstruction and construction of rail- 
roads. I feel sure, therefore, that the world war has made available large 
markets for the railway equipment and supply manufacturers of the United 
States. 

Before the opportunity presented can be grasped, two things must be 
done : First, the countries which need railway equipment and supplies from 
the United States must be provided means for buying it. This presents a 
problem of international finance of the first importance and magnitude. 
Second, the railway equipment and supply manufacturers of the United 
States must thoroughly investigate foreign markets and adapt their manu- 
facturing methods, their practice in giving credit, and so on, to the require- 
ments of foreign governments and foreign railway companies. 

I am confident from developments which already have occurred that 
these things are going to be done, and that during the period of recon- 
struction there will be vast exports of railway equipment and supplies from 
the United States. 



86 




ROGER W. ALLEN 



Is a graduate of the New York Public Schools. He entered the 
publishing business in 1892, and has been Treasurer of the 
Allen-Nugent Company, the. Hat Trade Publishing Co. and the 
Millinery Trade Publishing Co. for 17 years. He is at present 
President of the New York Business Publishers' Association. 
He organized and. was Executive Secretary of the great Pre- 
paredness Parade in Neic York City in 1916. This was the first 
of similar parades in 92 other cities. He is active in numerous 
civic and national patriotic movements 



GERMAN CRIMES 
By Roger W. Allen 

I received certain very distinct impressions as the result of the oppor- 
tunity afforded our party through the courtesy of the British Ministry of 
Information and I think not the least important of the impressions with its 
consequent lesson, was that the British Government had acted most wisely 
in taking absolutely into its confidence representative citizens of the United 
States, selecting those who, by reason of their particular vocation, were in 
a position to influence public opinion and in an open and above-board man- 
ner put their cards on the table face up and had, at the outset, translated 
their invitation briefly as follows: — "Come visit us; see what we have 
done and are doing; get all the information you wish, go anywhere you care 
to in our own country, or in the battle areas; make your own observations, 
form your own opinions and when you go back home, tell the truth." 

The striking difference between this manner of getting facts before the 
people and the underhanded, sneaky form of German propaganda is worth 
remembering. I think I voice the sentiments of the entire party when I 
say that at no time were we denied any information that we sought, we 
went everywhere and anywhere we cared to and there was not a single in- 
stance where any undue influence was brought to bear upon us that might 
have an after effect on our opinions and actions. 

We received our first vivid impressions of the efficiency of the great 
British Navy as we zigzagged across the Atlantic. The impression of admi- 
ration for its efficiency was increased after we had sighted the northern coast 
of Ireland and when we reviewed the Grand Fleet in the Firth of Forth 
three days before the German submarines surrendered en masse, the impres- 
sion on me found voice in the exclamation, "The civilized people of the 
world may well thank God that there was a British Grand Fleet." 

I was impressed by the fact that the British man and British woman 
stood shoulder to shoulder in the great fight for the very existence of Civi- 
lization on earth. Never did they flinch, never did they complain and with 
what I believe is characteristic British reticence, never did they boast of 
what they had done; in fact I was impressed by the fact that in many 
instances they almost refused to admit that they had done anything. The 
whole world, however, knows what the British Empire did in this war. 

The comprehensive trip over practically the entire devastated portions 
of northern France and parts of Belgium impressed me most profoundly 

87 



American Journalists in Europe 

with the heinousness of the great German crime. These impressions will 
never be obliterated from my memory and that the entire blood-guilty 
nation, from its former Kaiser to the lowliest peasant, should escape even- 
tually punishment, seems unthinkable. They will not escape punishment 
if there is a God above and a place of future punishment, I believe there 
is the first — and hope there is a second — for Germany. 

Having been in England before the armistice, and after, and having 
learned at first hand of the completion of all aerial and military equipment 
necessary to thoroughly thrash the German nation into a realizing sense 
that they were beaten hopelessly in a material and military sense, I am 
personally impressed with the fact that in asking for the armistice and its 
granting, Germany and Austria simply cheated justice. I am, further, 
thoroughly convinced that Germany still remains a menace to the happi- 
ness and peace of the entire world. I am convinced of her arrogance and 
absolute lack of repentance for the million and one crimes committed in her 
name, and I am convinced that her nearest neighbor, the French nation, 
is right in asking that through concerted action of the Allies, Germany be 
made absolutely impotent for any further aggressions. I am certain that 
German propaganda today is more generally rife and more thoroughly 
dangerous than it ever was before and I think I see in the all too numerous 
attempts to create discord between the Allied nations and America, the 
stealthy, cowardly hand of the German propagandist. 

Of poor bleeding France, what can be said? Nearly 2,000,000 of her 
inhabitants lie buried in her blood-stained soil. Her children are fatherless 
and her wives are widows, and can we blame them if they insist that full 
precaution be taken that this world-wide offense against life and liberty and 
civilization shall never happen again? To one who has seen the battlefields 
of Verdun and other historic spots, it would seem as though every French 
poilu must have been entitled to the Croix de Guerre. 

I am deeply impressed with the fact, and fact it is, that the great United 
States of America must, and will want to, aid and succor the stricken peo- 
ples of Europe in their endeavor to rally from the awful blow that has fallen 
upon them. As to the peoples of Germany and Austria, for economic rea- 
sons only, they must be helped to rehabilitate themselves. They must be 
made strong to work. It must be made possible for them to earn money. 
Their country must produce, but every effort and every last mark that the 
people of Germany earn and every ounce of merchandise or foodstuffs pro- 
duced over and above the absolute necessities of her people for existence, 
should belong to the Allied nations for as many generations as is necessary 
for complete restitution and reparation. 

88 




W. W. MACON 



Graduate of Sibley College, Cornell University. Member of the 
American Society of Mechanical Engineers, American Society 
of Heating it Ventilating Engineers, Engineers' Club of New 
York, Brooklyn Engineers' Club, Cornell University Club, 
American Association for Labor Legislation, National Safety 
Council. He entered the publishing business in 1898, and has 
been Managing Editor of "'The Iron Age" for several years. He 
is the author of several engineering society papers 



OPPORTUNITY FOR CO-OPERATION 
By W. W. Macon 

British regard for Americans is genuine. Whatever may have been the 
attitude of self-sufficiency and superiority of the Briton in the past, he is 
now desirous of having closest possible relations with the United States. 
A vision of larger things than national self-interest has been given to those 
who have long carried the heavy burden. National safeguards are, to be 
sure, not lost sight of by the British, but the welfare of the world is also re- 
garded as an obligation. 

Americans do not fully comprehend the opportunity now held out for 
full co-operation. We are not a unit as admirers of the British, because of our 
cosmopolitan derivation; we have been too far from the conflict to appreci- 
ate its overshadowing humanizing effect. Nor does every hearthstone 
here as there bring its flood of vibrant memories of the ravages of war. A 
public sentiment has been evident abroad since Armistice Day that is bound 
to temper acts in international, commercial and political relations. 

Thus briefly outlined the foregoing covers one jof the outstanding im- 
pressions received during the sojourn in England and Scotland last Novem- 
ber and December. The one indelible impression is, of course, that of the 
fighting areas, which we visited in Belgium and France, but of which I am 
assuming others are writing. But the spirit of co-operation which the war 
has engendered should be emphasized. 

Specific instances of aggressive hunting in England for export business 
do not disprove the existence of the idealistic strain. Behind it, in fact, 
is a very practical idea. This is that there should be no destructive or ruin- 
ous competition to place business in neutral nations or those not relatively 
highly developed. With the great increases in industrial capacity, here and 
abroad, resulting from war demands, the old plan of maintaining full activ- 
ity by so-called dumping is a likely outcome without the rule of reason. 
There is some question that the non-industrial or undeveloped country 
should get its supplies at levels far below those of the home market. Let 
the wish for co-operation become fully mutual, and a practical way out 
ought to be found, even without special legislation. 

The labor situation at the time of our visit was naturally a topic of a 
major consideration. The signing of the armistice brought to the front 
matters of reconstruction, industrial readjustment and demobilization. 
The uninformed might well think it strange that the entire wage earner 

89 



American Journalists in Europe 

class speaking the same language as the employer class did not appear to 
comprehend the problems facing industry. Great volumes of literature 
had been printed by the Government and by private sources, and the 
newspapers are much given to essays on topics of the day. The brief 
observation possible between the periods of entertainment provided by the 
Ministry of Information left the conclusion that the wage earner counted 
more on discussions in the tap room and grog shops than he did on reading 
for himself. In spite of the absence of the language barrier, the war period 
conditions had not ironed out the labor-capital differences. 

The Briton, with his emphasis on the freedom of the individual, seems to 
be educated even more than he is in this country to accept the idea that he 
is rightfully a peer with any of the nation's leaders, not paying much atten- 
tion to the necessary preparation before he may become a Lloyd George. 
What results are likely from the great amount of governmental and other 
documents printed in the war period was not at all clear, but in December 
it was usual to find references to the higher efficiency of the worker in the 
United States, or, as it is more commonly expressed, the higher output per 
individual, due in part, of course, to the greater vogue of labor-saving ma- 
chinery in this country. 

A review in one's mind of the remarkable visit recalls interesting inci- 
dents almost without number but they must go undescribed. Like all our 
countrymen, we had come to regard England as one gigantic arsenal but we 
had hardly visualized the scale of operations. We hardly expected to find 
recently erected shops of immense proportions no longer necessary for 
Britain's own needs but lately given over to manufacture for United States' 
forces. It was thrilling to see numberless howitzers at the Beardmore 
shipyards near Glasgow ready for shipment to the American Expeditionary 
Eorces. It was bewildering to discover the character of castings and inci- 
dentally the scope and problems of design which had been met in making 
tanks as exhibited in a visit to the steel works of Hadfield's at Sheffield. 
It afforded a convincing proof of the destructiveness of war to witness the 
manufacture, as at the British Westinghouse plant at Trafford Park, Man- 
chester, of beautiful examples of multiple cylinder internal combustion 
engines — also for the tanks. 



90 




HENRY G. LORD 



He is a member of the Philadelphia Textile Institute and Na- 
tional Cotton Manufacturers' Association. He entered the pub- 
lishing business in 1884. and has been Treasurer and President 
of the Bragdon, Lord & Xagle Co. and its predecessors, publish- 
ers of the "Textile World Journal", "Textile News" and other 
technical publications for 24 years. He ivas for several years 
President of the New England Business Papers' Association, and 
is Past President of the Associated Business Papers, Inc. He is 
Councilor of the United States Chamber of Commerce 



RECONSTRUCTION 
By H. G. Lord 

The first impression I received at the very beginning of our trip was the 
truth of that statement that every returning visitor from Europe makes 
"that we in America do not know what is really meant to be at war." 

Apart from the awful horror and massacre of those who were actually 
living in the battle area, one got a realization of the fearful sacrifice that 
the war brought directly to every man, woman and child in England and 
France, and with that realization came admiration for their splendid courage 
and endurance. 

I was tremendously impressed with the achievements of the British Em- 
pire on land and sea not realized in the United States. Her great reserve 
power was brought out by the crisis. The immense number of volunteers 
who enrolled before conscription showed the completeness with which the 
whole nation was given up to the work of winning the war. There was a 
large increase in the productive power of all industries in spite of the decrease 
in the labor supply. 

I was deeply interested in the changed feeling for America from that 
which existed before the war. The English are far more cordial and sym- 
pathetic and apparently very desirous for our friendship. There was general 
appreciation of our share in winning the war, and every disposition to give 
us what seemed more than our share of credit. One striking evidence of the 
feeling of the people toward the United States occurred on Lord Mayor's Day 
when the great parade took place, in which were represented all branches 
of the British army, the naval forces, and the Allied troops. The immense 
crowd gave the American boys by far the most enthusiastic welcome. 

The visit to the Grand Fleet and the remembrance of the faithful work 
of our escorting destroyers gave some idea of the hardships and dangers to 
which British seamen were always exposed in their never-ending patrol of 
the sea. 

The visit to the battlefields of France impressed me with the frightful 
horror and destruction of modern warfare. The ruin and devastation of 
the war zone is beyond belief until seen, and the courage and endurance of 
the troops who fought under such conditions seems more than human. 

Perhaps the strongest impression was of the brutality and joy of de- 
struction and cruelty of the Germans who had occupied northern France. 
Before making this trip I had lurking doubts of the accuracy of the awful 

91 



American Journalists in Europe 

tales of horror we had heard in the United States. I have no doubts now 
of the truthfulness of any story of German atrocity, having seen the evi- 
dences of what they are capable of doing. Their devilish deeds were done 
by all classes of Germans in the occupied territory. With that feeling 
comes the conviction that the criminals responsible must be punished and 
terms of peace must be imposed on Germany as to make it impossible for 
such things ever to happen again. 

The problems of reconstruction impress one with their tremendous 
difficulties and vastness, but I am convinced that the faith, determination 
and courage that enabled us to win the war will be successful in meeting 
the problems of peace. The French look to the Allies to help them and they 
will not look in vain and they will also help themselves as they did in 1871. 

The splendid achievements of the Americans both on the battle-front 
and behind the lines are impressive and inspiring. They carried convic- 
tion of tremendous power and determined effort to win at any cost. It 
gave new courage to our Allies and corresponding discouragement to the 
enemy. 

I was impressed with the feeling in England and France that the United 
States must be the big factor in bringing about such a settlement at the 
Peace Conference that will prevent future wars. They know our motives 
are unselfish and look hopefully to us to play the leading part in making 
an effective World's Peace. I was impressed with their high expectations 
of good that would come from President Wilson's visit. The Peace Con- 
ference is of vast importance to them. They look for it to settle many old 
problems and point out the way for reconstruction. I hope we shall not 
disappoint them. 

I am impressed with the importance of a good understanding between 
the English-speaking peoples. We not only speak the same language, but 
we have the same ideas of decency, fair play, honor and justice and we 
believe in the greatest freedom and opportunity for the individual. Upon 
our close co-operation depends the peace of the world for the future. 

Faith, sacrifice, determination! These three words sum up briefly 
the strongest impressions I brought from my visit to England and France. 
Faith in the justice of their cause and its ultimate triumph, a faith that 
sustained them through the darkest hours and the conviction that right 
must triumph over might ; the spirit of cheerful sacrifice — private interests 
put in the background — service, property and life offered freely to the 
cause; the grim determination to see it through at any and all costs, the 
absolute will to victory — with no acknowledgment of the possibility of 
defeat. 

92 




EDWARD H. DARVILLE 



Entered the publishing business in 1892, and has been on the 
editorial staff of "Iron Age" and Associate Editor of "Hardware 
Age'-' for 10 years. He assisted Secretary Baker to recruit 
mechanicians for airplanes, and Chairman Hurley of the Ship- 
ping Board to get workers. Assisted General Sherrill to organize 
a trade paper luncheon and conference with Governor Whitman 



A BETTER UNDERSTANDING 
By E. H. Darville 

The trip of the American Trade Journalists' European party, New York 
to New York, October 25- January 1, last, was undertaken for the study of 
economic and social questions growing out of four years of war and to more 
intelligently comprehend them. 

Such a visit in conjunction with the British authorities was imperative, 
because of limited transportation and passport obstacles, coupled with food 
and lodging shortage. There was, too, a laudable incentive for closer inter- 
relations on vital subjects of mutual interest between English-speaking 
people, having a common heritage in history, literature and aspirations. 
British officials arranged travel accommodations, because of war-worn and 
widely devastated areas, furnishing a thoroughly competent escort from 
army, navy and civil sources. So with an admirable itinerary the travelers 
knew actual primary conditions at the source, covering considerable territory 
in least time at the close of hostilities. 

It is plain that the two English-speaking nations have learned to under- 
stand each other better, regardless of formal treaties, during the most 
gigantic struggle of all time and in the interest of universal freedom ; treaty 
obligations between them whenever and however made, unquestionably, 
will never become "scraps of paper". But Prussia's solemn bond appar- 
ently made to be broken, in the crisis was ruthlessly broken, and genera- 
tions of national good behavior will be necessary to regain the confidence 
and respect of honorable statesmen. So far there is no evidence of regret 
or repentance nor indication of desire to make restitution; nothing but a 
persistent chorus of groveling whines for undeserved liberality in peace 
terms. Like their Faust, they want to welch, and, with a cringing snivel, 
evade responsibility after proclaiming that they were for world domination 
or ruin. 

What German greed and arrogance did accomplish was to array solidly 
against them 14,000,000,000 of the 17,000,000,000 world population. Also, 
for the first time in history, to consolidate and turn against them people of 
nearly all religions to crush an insolent, domineering autocracy; notably 
the Shintoists of Japan, Confucianists and Taoists of China, Jews, Moham- 
medans, Buddhists, Animists and Hindus, Roman Catholics, Protestants, 
and even people of no religion. 

For ten weeks the travelers were painstaking inquisitors, working over- 
time. They were quizzing sailors, enlisted men, non-coms and auxiliaries, 

93 



American Journalists in Europe 

in quarters afloat and ashore, below and above decks, the Red Cross, 
Y. M. C. A., Knights of Columbus, Salvation Army and W. A. A. C.'s. 
Likewise meeting socially or on duty, Admirals, first lords of the Admiralty, 
Generals, Premiers, Chancellors, Judges, Dukes, Viscounts, Lords, Barons, 
Knights, Lord Mayors and Lord Provosts and other personages of rank and 
influence in the several countries; not mere possessors of honorary titles, 
but capable men in charge of great undertakings. There were conversa- 
tions aboard battleships, destroyers, transports, trains and camions, in 
depots, hotels, clubs and restaurants, forts, hospitals, dugouts, trenches, 
castles and chateaux ; aboard vessels of the Grand Fleet, in famous cathedrals 
and even in a giant Handley-Page airplane. Nevertheless the sovereignty 
of each individual was always under his OAvn hat and all reached their own 
conclusions founded on close personal observation and facts. 

Such an opportunity has perhaps never come to but few persons, chiefly 
because never before was there occasion or reason for a journey of like 
character. The members of the party were from New York, Boston, Cleve- 
land, Chicago and St. Louis. Originally the invitations to broaden the 
delegation geographically, included representatives from the South and Pa- 
cific Coast which, regretfully, could not be accepted. 

A partial list of the industries covered included iron, steel and non-ferrous 
metals, hardware, transportation, metallurgy and chemistry, machinery, 
automotive industries, electrical lines, fuel, textiles, shipping and marine 
engineering, foundries, wearables, leather and footwear, paints and oils, and 
other commodities, representing manufacturers, merchants and other 
businesses. 



0h 



94 




l_ 




DAVID BEECROFT 



Graduate of Ontario Normal College. Entered the publishing 
business some lo years ago, when he became assistant editor 
of "Motor Age". In 1911 he was promoted to directing editor of 
The Class Journal Company publications — "Automotive Indus- 
tries", "Motor Age", "Motor World", "Commercial Vehicle", 
'•Motor Boat", "Transfer d Storage", and "El Auto word 
Americano" 




HORACE M. SWETLAND 



Entered the publishing business M 1882, and has been continu- 
ously asssociated with industrial publications since that time. 
Founded •'Power" in 1884, and later "Marine Engineering." In 
1901 he organized The Class Journal Company, for the purpose of 
publishing industrial papers in the automotive field. This com- 
pany and its publications were merged with '!>> United Pub- 
lishers Corporation in 1911. He became President of the latter 
corporation in 1912, which position he lias held continuously 



EUROPEAN VISIT 

By David Beecroft 

The internationalizing of industries as proven necessary during the war, 
and the possibilities for continuing this process in peace impressed itself 
upon me more than anything else. 

It has been considered good business policy for concerns in an industry 
in any country to form organizations where interchanges of views are 
possible, and where policies for the betterment of the individuals as well as 
the industry are discussed. This is considered good business for domestic 
trade but heretofore we have stopped here. What has been good for 
domestic trade has not been good for foreign trade. We seem to have 
held the idea that what could be done among domestic manufacturers to 
advantage of all could not be done among manufacturers of different coun- 
tries. The political division of the world among different nations seems 
to have been father of the thought that the manufacturers of different 
nations could not possibly co-operate internationally. 

In the past we have been glad to get what we could by way of design 
and other industrial lessons from European countries, but positive efforts 
for periodic getting together of leaders in these industries have never been 
made. The industry in one nation has looked upon the industry in other 
nations as competition. Political barriers of international character seem 
to stand in the way of all organized getting together. 

It never was deemed desirable that the industries of different nations 
could get togther with regard to foreign trade in the same sense that domes- 
tic industries operated together with regard to domestic trade. If the get- 
together movement was good for the industries of one country with regard 
to its domestic trade, then the get-together movement of different nations 
for world trade should also prove beneficial. Heretofore the view of differ- 
ent nations with regard to world trade seems to have been based on the 
thought that there was a very limited amount of world trade, not enough 
for all the nations, and that secrecy and individual effort nationally were 
the best methods for securing such trade. 

The war has proved the greatest tutor of internationalism. All forms 
of automotive apparatus built in different countries were brought together 
in Europe and had to operate in a common organization and to a common 
end. This was imperative if efficiency were to be obtained. It was 
early discovered that international standardization of aircraft parts was 

95 



American Journalists in Europe 

imperative if speedy production Avere to be accomplished. This inter- 
national standardization was also necessary if speedy and reasonably cheap 
maintenance were to be possible. This international standardization was 
necessary if successful operation were to be possible. 

The personal acquaintances made will prove of greatest enduring value. 
It is personality that binds nations and industries together. Through 
closer personality lies the pathway to greater industrial efficiency, closer 
industrial co-operation, and the elimination of industrial abuses. After a 
visit such as ours you cannot but conclude that what is good for the mem- 
bers of an industry in one nation in a national sense is very largely equally 
good among the members of like industries in different nations. 

The European industries suffered a great deal more because of the war 
than corresponding industries in America. European industries suffered a 
loss of their designing organization ; their financing organization ; and their 
merchandising organization. During the war their sole problem was pro- 
duction. This continued for three, and in some cases, four years. The 
personnel was in many cases lost. Past experience was to a large extent 
lost. Rebuilding is going to be very slow. 

Their delay is greater because of the reaction of the workers. Workers 
in factories during the war were as devoted to their work as those at the 
front. It was a constant grind with war the only business of the nations, 
whether at home, in the factory, or in the shop. This concentration con- 
tinued until November 11. The reaction immediately set in but no one was 
able to gauge its extent. Instead of coming to a peak in a week or two 
months have been required. It will be months before the new post-war 
normal level has been reached. It will be well on in 1920 before production 
is at anything like normal. At that time manufacturers will not have com- 
pleted the formation of their permanent policies. 

Europe has a better physical equipment for industry than she had before 
the war. Her new factories are from two to ten times the capacity of the 
old ones. They are equipped with more modern machinery than Europe 
ever had before. The old prejudice of workers against production machin- 
ery has largely ceased. Modern working conditions among laborers have 
been installed. The worker has progressed several generations in the last 
five years. The European worker has rubbed elbows with the American 
worker. They have interchanged views on standards of home life; stand- 
ards of recompense ; standards of hours of labor per day ; standards of work- 
ing conditions; standards of social life; and standards of production. These 
have had a far-reaching effect. 



96 




FREDERIC F. CUTLER 



Is a graduate of the Boston Latin School, member of the Ameri- 
can Leather Chemists' Association and the Society of Leather 
Trade Chemists of England. He entered the publishing business 
in 18S9, and has been President and Treasurer of the Shoe it 
Leather Reporter Co. and the Shoe Retailer Co. for IS years 



A BETTER UNDERSTANDING 
By F. F. Cutler 

I could not help but be impressed that it was a happy idea when the 
British Ministry of Information invited American publishers and editors 
to come across and see England and France at war. The trip surely gave 
us a different angle of vision as to the English people and their way of doing 
things. 

I was impressed with the great hospitality extended to us and the fine 
sentiments which were expressed on every hand. I was particularly im- 
pressed with the luncheon given to us by Lord Northcliffe at the Times 
Building in Printing House Square. I think it was most complimentary 
to the business paper publishers of America, not only to give us the excellent 
luncheon, but to take such an interest in us as to invite the British captains 
of industry to talk to us. 

I was impressed with the manner and spirit with which everybody in 
England and France did his or her bit toward the successful conclusion of 
the war, the sacrifices made and the determination which everybody seemed 
to have to see it through. The women in particular impressed me fully as 
much as did the men. 

I was impressed with the wonderful work of the English Fleet and the 
men who manned the different ships, both the navy vessels and the mer- 
chant marine. Then when you consider the great army that England 
developed — over 5,000.000 men out of England, Scotland and Wales alone— 
surely it was wonderful. 

I was also tremendously impressed with the wonderful spirit of the 
French people. They lost so much, not only in the sacrifices of lives of 
husbands, brothers, fathers, etc., but in material things through the de- 
vastation of their cities and towns and the destruction of the productivity 
of their soil. 

I was tremendously impressed with the loyalty of the English colonies, 
how they stuck to her. Surely it was conclusive proof that England is a 
good ruler. 

I was also impressed with the soundness of the idea of an Alliance of the 
English-speaking peoples of the world. Such an alliance, I feel confident, 
will be the greatest possible aid to permanent peace; it will be the strongest 
possible aid in forming and maintaining a League of Nations. 

I was particularly impressed with the thought that if all the editors and 
publishers who made that wonderful trip abroad would do their part in 

97 



American Journalists in Europe 

propaganda work, toward creating a clearer understanding between the 
people of America, France and Great Britain, it would be for the benefit of 
mankind. We can do such propaganda work through our publications 
and by reciting our experiences and impressions verbally, through our 
trade associations, clubs and other meetings, and I hope all of us are doing 
this very thing. 



0& 

ten? 



98 




H. C. PARMELEE 



In the University of Nebraska he attained the degree of B. Sc. 
1897, A. M. 1S99. Is a member of the American Chemical So- 
ciety, American Electrochemical Society and the American In- 
stitute of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers. He has been in 
editorial work for the last 14 years, progressing from the edi- 
torship of the "Mining Reporter" to that of the "Western Chem- 
ist & Metallurgist". He is at present editor of the "Chemical «( 
Metallurgical Engineering". He has just concluded a term of the 
Presidency of the Colorado School of Mines 



INHUMAN WARFARE 
By H. C. Parmelee 

After a lapse of six months my mind seems to have retained most tena- 
ciously two impressions out of the kaleidoscopic view we had of Europe in 
the last days of 1918. The first is the unfeigned sincerity of the Rritish 
people in their desire for closer and more amicable relations with the people 
of the United States; and the second is the pitiable plight of the people of 
France whose homes were devastated by something worse than pestilence 
and whose industries were systematically laid waste and ruined. Of both 
these general impressions there are many examples. 

As evidence of the first I have but to recall the hospitality shown us by 
people of high and low degree; the courtesy extended to us on the day after 
our arrival, at the Lord Mayor's Show, where practically the only demon- 
stration made by the people was the applause accorded a unit of United 
States Infantry; the simple and sincere reception given us at the historic 
home of the Duke of Sutherland; the frank expressions of friendship spoken 
on every occasion by Rritish citizens of all classes; and the almost embar- 
rassing recognition and acknowledgment of the important part played by 
the United States in ending the great struggle. A typical instance was the 
arrangement made for the entertainment of American soldiers on leave in 
London, by the "Ministry of Information, Department of Hospitality to 
American Forces." No evidence could be more convincing of the Rritish- 
er's desire to join forces with the United States for something more than the 
defeat of a common enemy! There was recognition of the fact that the 
English-speaking peoples of the world can and must control its destinies 
if humanity is to rise to its highest development. 

A volume might be written of the visit to the Grand Fleet; of the tradi- 
tional discipline of the Rritish navy, and the dogged perseverance with which 
it watched in the North Sea for four long years; of its satisfaction at the 
final abject surrender of the enemy — a sentiment not unmixed, however, 
with regret that a direct encounter was never afforded. Nothing can ever 
efface the memory of our reception on a few of the great battleships of the 
Rritish navy, and the terms of high regard and warm appreciation in which 
Rritish officers spoke of our own navy and its participation in the war. 

Of the other group of impressions — those of France in ruins — I cannot 
grow so enthusiastic, for obvious reasons, although the most depressing 
scenes usually were lightened by some new evidence of fortitude on the part 

99 



American Journalists in Europe 

of the people, or relieved by stories of bravery and heroic action by the sol- 
diery. Of Douai, however, I cannot think with composure. The system- 
atic destruction by the Germans of the homes of that defenceless city, the 
violation of the sanctity of its churches and the wanton vandalism displayed 
on every hand cry aloud for justice, if not vengeance, and rouse the passions 
of anger and hatred. I can still see the pathetic figure of Dr. Paul Robaut, 
Red Cross secretary, as he stood in despair amid the ruins of his home 
where he had housed the German Red Cross for many months. No earth- 
quake or tornado or other convulsion of nature could have done the damage 
and destruction that German hands had wrought before they left the place 
that had been their home during the war. 

Of Ypres, Arras, Lens, Albert, Rapaume, Noyon and Rheims, the 
recollections are mainly a succession of surprises at the completeness of the 
destruction by hunnish hands. Cathedrals seemed to be objects of par- 
ticular displeasure to the Germans, and systematic efforts were made to 
reduce them to ruins. It seemed as though we could always find more 
fragments of shrapnel and high-explosive shells in cathedrals than elsewhere. 

In France, as in England, there was ample evidence of full appreciation 
of America's part in the war, and the most effusive welcome on the part 
of citizens of all classes. Witness the demonstration of that little baker 
and his family at Noyon, who welcomed us to his reconstructed home and 
workshop as though we were long-lost relatives, and who finally insisted on 
giving us — Americans from the land of plenty — a loaf of fresh bread when 
we departed. It was a simple but genuine evidence of gratitude and appre- 
ciation, such as was accorded us in a variety of ways wherever we went! 

Of London on armistice day and of Paris on the day of President 
Wilson's arrival — two of the most notable popular demonstrations in con- 
nection with the war — volumes might be written. Roth were spontaneous 
expressions in the mass such as will not soon be witnessed in the world's 
history. The former manifested great relief from danger that had threatened 
a nation for over four years, and the latter expressed the hope of a people 
that a day had dawned that promised peace. With both of these sentiments 
we Americans were sympathetic in the highest degree, because we could 
realize in a measure what the war had meant to those who were close to it. 



100 




FLOYD W. PARSONS 



Graduated from Lehigh University in 1902. Member of American 
Institute of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers; The Mining and 
Metallurgical Society of America; various coal mining institutes ; 
Academy of Political Science and the American Academy of 
Political and Social Science. Has been chief engineer of the Victor 
American Fuel Co. and the Colorado & Southeastern Railroad. 
Entered the publishing business in 1906. Was associate editor of 
the '-Engineering and Mining Journal;" editor of "Coal Age," and 
now is editor of "Everybody's Business," a department in the 
••Saturday Evening Post" 



SEVERAL IMPORTED IMPRESSIONS 
By Floyd W. Parsons 

In the matter of the visit of business publishers and editors to Europe, 
I am unable to feel like a full-fledged member of the party. Due to illness 
my stay was the shortest of all, and for the same reason, my observations 
were less than any of the others who made the journey. 

As to my impressions, they were twofold: First, were those obtained 
in the capacity of an American citizen; second, were the ones I gathered 
acting in the role of an engineer and coal-mining editor. Concerning 
number one, I realized as never before that the difference between the 
Rritisher and the American is the result of environment and inherited 
tradition, not a variation or unlikeness of physical and mental composition. 
Caste and class in Great Rritain are more deep-rooted, more intense than 
is snobbery, their equivalent, in the United States. It is for this reason 
that I object to the thought that the Rritish industrial problems, especially 
relating to labor, are similar to our own. For the same reason, Ireject the 
thought that the remedial measures of the Rritish government are policies 
that we may well pattern after. The conditions of labor and commerce in 
the two nations are radically different, and I returned to America possessed 
of the idea that it is an error to assume that the factors creating unrest in 
Europe are the same as those that exist in the United States. If this is a 
fact, then it follows that we must apply American methods to the treat- 
ment of American problems. Only confusion and failure will result from 
any imitation of European methods in solving the vital questions that now 
confront us. During the war, we were wise to profit by the experience of 
others, but we are now entering an era of peace and greater independence. 

As a coal-mining engineer, my first observation was the lack of heated 
houses, hotels and public buildings in Great Rritain. The fact that the war 
was on, had little bearing on the matter, for the reason that the average 
Rritish building is wholly without a heating plant. Of all methods of burn- 
ing coal, the Rritish open grate is the least economical. The overseas 
answer to this criticism is that the heated house is hurtful to health, but to 
the American, it appears that the dearth of heating plants in Great Rritain 
is due to transmitted custom rather than any idea of benefiting the race. 

The Rritisher, as well as all other foreigners, has gained a new concep- 
tion of the United States and its people. We went into the war clean and 
we have come out that way. We are no longer a nation with nothing but 

101 



American Journalists in Europe 

dollar ideals. America was always puzzled by the fact that in trading 
abroad, something besides quality and price seemed to govern sales. Now 
we are aware that the something we lacked was background, and we have 
come to know that the chief thing we gained dining the war is this same 
valuable background. We are now given credit for being something rather 
than simply a people who has done something. 

As a final observation, let me say that we are the only nation that pokes 
fun at our own tourists. The average American is none too proud of his 
fellow citizens who visits foreign lands. The truth is, the American tourist 
is not nearly as comical as many other nationals who travel. The war has 
given the United States the full respect of other peoples; it has given us 
the greatest opportunity in our history. If we do not rise to the occasion, 
we will surely deserve the scorn of the generations of Americans that are 
to come. 



0h 



102 



SUMMARY 

By H. M. Swetland 

The impressions of the writer have been very generously stated in the 
earlier pages, but it is perhaps allowable to emphasize those most important. 

Immensity of War Enterprises 

Nothing less than personal contact with the great war achievements 
could have established a lasting impression of the immensity of war pro- 
gramme in this country and on the Continent. While we had felt the 
impression of American activities, we were wholly unprepared for the 
strenuous development of English and French endeavor. England and 
France had concentrated every available force to one end, and this immense 
undertaking superseded every other line of endeavor. 

The Great Men of England 

Again we have learned that nothing short of personal contact gives the 
correct impression. The efforts of the great leaders of the Empire were 
familiar to us in a general way from the records of their great achievements; 
but a closer contact gave a stronger impression of their ability to con- 
duct the affairs of the Empire under any possible emergency. It is reassur- 
ing to feel that the civilization of the world is in safe hands as long as the 
burden rests mainly with these great men. 

Hereditary Customs and Institutions — 

It was our previous thought that many of the hereditary customs and 
formalities of the English people were more a tribute to their historic signifi- 
cance than of any consequence to the maintenance of an empire. A closer 
contact with many of these ancient customs has given us a different idea of 
their significance and the power and influence which they perpetuate among 
these people. We came to respect the institutional basis of a great nation 
when we found that these things had a far-reaching influence on the estab- 
lishment and perpetuation of individual ideals and ambitions. We recog- 
nized their importance in English affairs; and we admit at once that the 
institutional process is a curb on the selfishness of the individual. America, 
without adopting the ancient rites and ceremonies of England, can profit 
generously by adopting the English idea of institutional organization. 

103 



American Journalists in Europe 

The British Fleet — 

That overwhelming spectacle, — the concentration of the naval power 
of the Empire, — created a lasting impression. Formerly, the immensity 
of this aggregation of fighting machinery seemed an unnecessary and some- 
what spectacular exhibition of power. But when we reflect that the civili- 
zation of the world has been saved through this factor of British fore- 
thought, we are ready to accept the English control of the seas with the full 
belief that it will be used in the future as it has in the past — "Solely for the 
protection of civilization." 

Industries of England and France — 

We were wholly unprepared for the great development of the industries 
of England and France, and we were surprised to find how quickly they had 
developed the most modern practices, and to observe the efficiency of 
every enterprise. We were prepared for the part played by women in this 
development, but had no conception of the extent and the efficiency of their 
efforts. It was also pleasing to note that a habit of quality production, 
which has for centuries dominated the major products of England and 
France, was not lost sight of in the immensity of the undertakings; in fact, 
the war materials were produced with greater care, for the services of these 
materials and machines were essential to winning the war. 

Devastation of the War — 

Our brief story of what we saw in the devastated areas is a weak attempt 
to portray the most stupendous destruction that has visited the world since 
the beginning of time. No previous war existed at a period of such potent 
development of the inventive genius and capacity of humanity. It follows 
that when this development was therefore directed exclusively to the crea- 
tion of machines of destruction, an unparalleled result followed. The de- 
vastated area of France will remain for many years an object lesson to the 
world of the danger of modern human warfare. 

In Conclusion — 

May we here finally commend the inspiration which has assisted in a 
better understanding between the two great English-speaking nations, 
and endorse from personal experience the necessity for a more intimate 
relationship? 



104 



INTRODUCTION TO APPENDIX 

IN indicating with some detail the various publications 
represented in the party, and the character and size of the 
industries which these publications serve, some general statis- 
tics on each class of industry have been given. 

These general statistics have been taken from the various 
sources of information and the sources noted in most cases. 
It has been impossible to compile them for one year so that 
they would be comparable from the basis of a given period. 
The methods of classification of the industries vary according 
to the sources of information and the general totals are affected 
by these methods of classification. It is probable that there 
is some overlapping as between the various classifications 
which affects the general totals. All such general statistics 
are estimated to some extent and there is considerable varia- 
tion in the estimated figures from various sources. They are 
presented as indications, gathered with care, from the recog- 
nized authorities and checked as definitely as possible. To 
that extent they are accurate. 



105 



APPENDIX 



irm 



HE industrial pross of the United States carries specialization to a degree not 
practiced by publishers in any other country. The growth of the industrial 
press in the United States has been greater than in any other country and, 
perhaps, the specialization of this press, so that it can deal more intimately 
with a given set of problems, has a logical relation to the larger growth. The general 
practice in other countries is to cover all phases of an industry, including the production, 
merchandising and utility, in one publication. This obtains in all industries with the 
exception of specialized journals devoting themselves to engineering. In this country 
the leading industries are served by periodicals devoted exclusively to each of the important 
branches.. 

The most important difference between the industrial press in this country and the 
corresponding press in other industrial countries is the difference in the scope and authority 
of the publications individually. The industrial press in the United States has not only 
grown to very much larger dimensions, but it has acquired an authority in the important 
fields of industry that marks it out more definitely than the greater physical growth. The 
specialization which has occurred has made it possible to devote the energy of a publication 
to a much more definite field and permitted it to record the practice, the markets and the 
use of products, to forecast and to summarize the developments in a much more effective 
way for its subscribers. 

The publications represented in the party serve the following industries: 

Railways, transportation and warehousing. 
Iron, steel and metal, production and sale. 
Textile manufacturing and merchandising. 

Automotive industries, manufacturing and merchandising of automobiles, trucks, 
tractors and aircraft. 

Shipbuilding and shipping. 

Building and lumber. 

Mining and metallurgy. 

Electricity, production, sale and operation of electrical machinery and apparatus. 

Boot, shoe and leather industry, manufacturing and merchandising. 

Engineering. 

Industrial chemistry. 

Export trade. 

Railroads — 

Railways, transportation and warehousing were represented by the Railway Age, 
Electric Railway Journal, Railway Electrical Engineer, Railway Mechanical Engineer, Railway 
Maintenance Engineer, Railway Signal Engineer and Transfer and Storage. 

In the various branches of the transportation business these publications are recog- 
nized as current authorities in their various specialized fields. The railway papers have 

107 



American Journalists in Europe 

developed along with the development of the industry and have exercised a strong influ- 
ence in the remarkable growth of that field in this country and its position as the most 
efficient railway system in the world. 

The records of the report of the Administrator-General of Railroads give the following 
information : 

(Taken From Secretary McAdoo's Report, September 3, 1918) 

Mileage in operation 266,031 

Employed 1,700,814 

Companies 2,905 

Bonds $10,875,206,565 

Stocks $8,755,403,517 

Freight cars 2,326,987 

Passenger cars 54,664 2,381,651 

Locomotives 62,603 

(Figures for 1918 From Railway Age) 

Wages $2,593,085,502 

Gross earnings 4,913,319,604 

Expenses 4,006,894.762 

(Taken From Secretary McAdoo's Report, February 4, 1919) 

1918 

Equipment authorized $658,893,761 

Additions and betterments 573,150,159 

Construction 46,771,078 . 

Total $1,278,814,998 

That part of transporting and distributing covered in the warehousing business has not 
been classified separately through any of the regular sources. It represented a large field 
even before the war, and during the war the necessities involving new distribution and 
warehousing of many millions of dollars of material of all kinds resulted in the rapid 
growth and consolidation of this business, so that it is now developing into a well-defined, 
special group. 

Iron and Sleel — 

The general iron and steel and various metal industries were represented in the party by 
The Iron Age, Iron Trade Review, Iron Trade and Metal Market Report and Foundry, to 
which may be added the American Machinist and the Hardware Age. 

All of the papers which have been indicated are strong publications, with a very close 
and influential contact with the executives in this important group of industries. 

As their names imply, The Iron Age and the Iron Trade Review devote themselves to 
the production of iron and steel and their products; the Iron Trade and Metal Market Report 
and Foundry occupying itself exclusively with the market, and The American Machinist 
and Hardware Age, as indicated, specializing upon definite trade developments in this field. 

The importance of the iron and steel industries, with its ramifications, perhaps, can be 
better understood from the following analysis. 

108 



Appendix 

(From Bureau of Census, 1914, Department of Commerce) 

Industry No. Firms Employees Capital Production 

Aggregate 17.719 1,001,058 $4,281,998,000 $8,228,144,000 

Foundry and machine shops 10,640 362.171 1,246,084,000 866,545,000 

Machine shops 9,340 285,0.". 1 1,065,420,000 7 12,976,000 

Hardware 539 41,213 92,302,000 78,320,000 

Blast furnaces, steel works, and rolling mills. 587 278.07-2 1,720,653,000 1,236,319,000 

Steel ingot production, li) IS, 43,027,000 gross inns, estimate (American Institute Steel and Iron). 
Pig iron production, 1017. 39,051,991 gross tons, actual (American Institute Steel and Iron). 

In general, the processes of conversion and rolling are grouped under the heading "Blast 
Furnaces, etc." More highly elaborated products are grouped under "Foundry and 
machine shops." The "Foundry and machine shop" industry does not cover, however, 
those cases where the establishments make exclusively some specific articles or class of 
machinery or tools. Such establishments have been put in the special industries. Since 
the figures have been compiled in 1914, which was a dull steel year, the iron and steel 
industry has greatly increased in size on account of the demand created by the war. As 
the 1918 wholesale prices for steel were more than double those of 1914, the valuation of the 
production shows a big increase. 

There is considerable overlapping of the groups, but The Iron Age states the iron and 
steel industry, including only the establishments, which under strict interpretation may be 
classified here, employ approximately 600,000 persons, have an annual payroll of approxi- 
mately $1,000,000,000 and an investment of $3,000,000,000. According to the same 
authority there are now 5,898 foundries in the United States employing 250,000, with a 
capital investment of $400,000,000. The production of these foundries is approximately 
1,375,000 tons of steel castings, 800,000 of malleable iron castings, and 150,000 tons of brass 
and non-ferrous castings. Further figures from The Iron Age show there are 10,000 firms 
engaged in the production of machinery, employing 320,000 men, having an investment of 
about $1,000,000,000 and an annual production of approximately $860,000,000. The 
Hardware Age estimates there are 2,804 firms manufacturing hardware, employing 156,898, 
paying $91,000,000 in wages, having invested $424,302,000, and producing approximately 
$369,191,000. 

Textile — 

The textile and allied industries ramify into so many special lines, covering as they do 
thousands of items, that it was appropriate the members of the party should include rep- 
resentatives of a number of journals in this field. These representatives included 
Textile World Journal, the leading paper in this country devoted to the manufacture of 
textiles; Dry Goods Economist, Dry Goods Reporter, Drygoodsman, and the Pacific Coast 
Merchant, the leading papers devoted to the merchandising of textiles and textile products; 
American Hatter, specializing exclusively on the manufacture and merchandising of 
hats; NugenCs Garment Weekly, devoted to the manufacture and sale of garments, and the 
Millinery Trade Review, covering the manufacture and sale of millinery. 



109 



American Journalists in Europe 

(From Bureau of Census, 1914, Department of Commerce) 

Industry No. Firms Employees Capital Production 

Aggregate 22,995 1,498,66-1 $2,810,848,000 $3,414,615,000 

Textile fabrics and materials 5,942 950,880 2,122,828,000 1,935,344,000 

Articles from textile fabrics for personal wear 14,953 510,595 571,866,000 1,297,273,000 

Other textile products 2,100 37,189 116,134,000 181,798,000 

Millinery and lace 2,079 45,274 53,101,000 114,160,000 

Hats and caps 1,715 65,891 85,539,806 138,622,200 

Clothing (men's and women's) 11,186 394,626 428,543,000 1,027,914,000 

This group is broadly divided here into three divisions, namely, those engaged in the 
manufacture of the fabric, those converting fabric into articles of personal wear and those 
making other textile products. Since these figures were compiled in 1914 the industry has 
greatly grown in size and the wholesale prices of the commodities involved have practically 
doubled. Wages have increased to a great extent also. 

The Textile World Journal states the following figures are approximately correct for the 
present conditions in plants where raw material is converted into yarn, cloth or knit goods: 

Number of establishments 6,000 

Number of employees 1,000,000 

Capital $2,500,000,000 

Value of materials used $2,000,000,000 

Materials used: 

Cotton (pounds) 3,840,000,000 

Wool (pounds, grease) 740,000,000 

Silk (pounds) 50,000,000 

Cotton products $1,250,000,000 

Wool products 750,000,000 

Silk products 500,000,000 

Knit goods 500,000,000 

Value of products $3,000,000,000 

From different estimates made by Dry Goods Economist, Dry Goods Reporter, The 
Drygoodsman and the Pacific Coast Merchant, American Halter, Nugent' s Garment Weekly, 
and the Millinery Trade Review, the following facts and figures have been taken. The 
total number of establishments in the textile industry, including not only the manufac- 
ture of the fabric, but those which convert the fabric into articles of personal wear, number 
23,000, with a capital investment of $4,000,000,000. The merchandising publications 
reach approximately 25,000 individuals and department dry goods stores, and approxi- 
mately 1,000 wholesalers. These stores have an approximate capitalization of $500,000,000. 

Automotive — ■ 

The automotive field, which has risen to a position of such importance in a compara- 
tively few years in the United States and presenting in its short history so many interesting 
developments, was represented by Automotive Industries, Motor World, Motor Age and 
Commercial Vehicle. 

Automotive Industries, as its name implies, specializes upon the manufacture of auto- 
motive equipment and parts. 

Motor Age and Motor World reach the distributing field, going to the wholesale and 
retail establishments concerned with the sale and maintenance of this equipment, Motor 

110 



Appendix 

Age specializing largely upon the maintenance and Motor World upon merchandising. Com- 
mercial Vehicle is looked upon as authority among owners of fleets of commercial automo- 
tive apparatus. 

(From Bureau of Census, 1914, Department of Commerce) 
(Automobile Classification) 
Industry No. Firms Employees Capital Production 

Aggregate 1,271 145,951 $407,730,000 $632,831,000 

It is estimated by the Automotive Industries that in 1919 the value of cars, trucks, 
tractors, motorcycles and accessories will be over $3,000,000,000. This is an increase 
of fifty per cent over the 1914 figures. In 1918, cars, motor trucks and motorcycles con- 
sumed, according to an estimate by the National Petroleum News, over 2,320,000,000 
gallons of gasoline. This represents a total value of more than $500,000,000. 

Motor World and Motor Age estimate there are over 47,000 dealers and garages for 
automotive products, with a capital investment of more than $200,000,000. 

Shipping — 

Shipbuilding and shipping were represented by Marine Engineering, Marine Review, 
to which might be added Motor Boat and Power Boat. 

Shipbuilding and shipping, as important developments of the United States' industrial 
expansion, date from the beginning of the war. 

In this expansion the papers dealing with that field have played a notable part. That 
the United States must continue to develop its facilities for shipbuilding and its ownership 
of ships for overseas trade is admitted on all sides, and it is evident that this branch of 
industrial endeavor will exert a powerful influence upon the position of this country in 
world affairs. 

(From United States Shipping Board Report, September 1, 1918) 
(For Ships of 2,500 Tons or Over) 

203 shipyards, 1,020 ways. 

1,952,675 dead weight tons produced between August 20, 1917, and August 30, 1918. 

386,000 employed in manufacturing these. 

$10,500,000 weekly payroll. 

The figures above do not cover any establishments building boats of less than 2,500 
tonnage. 

It is estimated by Marine Engineering that the investment in ships and shipyards is 
$4,500,000,000. The Commissioner of- Navigation states there are in the neighborhood 
of 220.000 men employed on the 27,000 vessels documented by the United States Govern- 
ment. Marine Engineering also estimates there are about 1,000 steamship and steam- 
boat companies in the United States. 

According to Marine Engineering, there are 1,000 concerns dealing in marine supplies 
and fittings. Motor Boat states there are 110 companies manufacturing marine engines, 
100 firms building power boats, and employing 7,000 people. 

Building — 

The building industry was represented by the American Architect, a technical publi- 
cation devoted to architecture and reaching the 4,500 architects in the United States; the 

111 



American Journalists in Europe 

Building Age, serving 312,000 builders, employing 1,550,000 men, with an investment of 
$10,000,000,000, and producing a normal annual capacity of $3,700,000,000; Metal Worker, 
devoted to domestic engineering, plumbing, heating and metal work; American Paint and 
Oil Dealer, representing the paint and varnish industry, comprising about 700 manufac- 
turing concerns that manufacture for general distribution, while there are perhaps 1,000 
smaller ones with a local trade, or specializing on a few products. 

Mining — 

The mining industry was represented by Engineering and Mining Journal and Coal Age. 

The mining industry is, perhaps, the most important single industry outside of food pro- 
duction, including as it does the extraction of the raw material for a host of other industrial 
requirements, and the fuel for a large percentage. The statistics on this field are not by any 
means complete. 

There are estimated 24,000 concerns engaged in mining, employing about 1,000,000 
workers and requiring nearly $4,000,000,000 of invested capital. 

(From Bureau of Census, 1914, Department of Commerce) 

Employed, 1910 963,760 

Value of metals, 1914 $2,115,000,000 

Value of metals, 1915 2,397,000,000 

Value of metals, 1916 3,315,000,000 

Lumber — 

The lumber industry was represented by Lumber, a publication of two sections, one 
section for the lumber manufacturer, of which there are probably 50,000, ranging in size 
from small portable plants to mills having a capacity of 1,000,000 feet per day. 

Lumber played an important part in our activities and consequently the industry 
developed greatly. Complete figures showing this increase are not available. The fol- 
lowing figures must be considered as materially less than present-day output and capacity. 

(From Bureau of Census, 1914, Department of Commerce) 

Industry No. Firms 

Aggregate 42,036 

Lumber and timber products 27,229 

Lumber mills products, not connected with saw mills. 5,841 

As lumber has advanced at least fifty per cent in price since 1914 and wages have in- 
creased, these figures are larger for the present. 

It is estimated by Lumber there are at present approximately 27,000 lumber merchants 
in the United States. Eleven thousand of these yards have an approximate investment 
of $300,000,000. 

Electrical — 

The electric industry was represented by Electrical World, serving the manufacturer 
and operator of electrical apparatus, and Electrical Merchandising, specializing upon the 
retail trade, including the new business department of the electric light and power plants^ 
and the Electrical Dealer and Contractor. 

112 



Employees 


Capital 


Production 


833,529 


$1,723,456,000 


$1,599,710,000 


479,786 


916,574,000 


715,310,000 


96,214 


266,805,000 


307,673,000 



Appendix 
The only figures given by the Census Bureau in this industry are: 

Production of electrical machinery, apparatus and supplies.. . . $335,170,194 

Electrical World estimates that $3,000,000,000 are invested in electric light and power 
systems in this country, and $750,000,000 invested in the manufacture of electrical 
apparatus. 

Leather — 

The boot, shoe and leather industry was represented by the Boot and Shoe Recorder, 
New }ork Daily Hide Report, Chicago Daily Hide Report, Shoe and Leather Reporter and 
the Shoe Retailer. 

(From Bureau of Census, 1914, Department of Commerce) 

Industry No. Firms Employees Capital Production 

Aggregate 6,758 307,060 $743,347,000 $1,104,594,000 

Boots and shoes 1,355 '210,348 254,590,000 501,560,000 

Exports in 1917 reached the total of $153,700,573. 

It is estimated by the papers in this field that there are about 30,000 retail stores. 
Since 1914 all figures have been increased to a great extent. 

Engineering and Contracting Industry — 

This industrial activity was represented by Engineering News-Record and Power. 

This industry is so closely identified with every other industry that it is almost impos- 
sible to make any classification without duplicating the records in other industries. What 
is correctly considered construction work here may be treated as capital in another indus- 
try. The field covered is broad and cannot be exactly measured, but the Engineering 
News-Record estimates it embraces 300,000 different organizations in all the branches 
where engineering and contracting is done, employs approximately 7,000,000, produces 
annually $24,000,000,000. and has an investment of $22,000,000,000. 

The production in this field includes a great many items finished and included in the 
production of other fields. The net total, excluding those, would be $12,000,000,000. 

Chemicals — 

The chemical industry was represented by Chemical and Metallurgical Engineering. 

This industry is another of the industrial activities in the United States fundamentally 
affected by the war. 

The demands of the conflict resulted in a voluminous growth and the extension of this 
business into fields not previously of importance to this country. 

(From Bureau of Census, 1914, Department of Commerce) 

Industry No. Firms Employees Capital Production 

Aggregate 12,374 299,569 $3,034,200,000 $2,001,634,000 

Chemicals 395 32,311 224,340,000 158,053,000 

Paints and varnishes 800 10,083 129,534,000 145,624.000 

The group includes not only the industries whose products are chemical in the ordinary 
sense of that term, but also the industries which employ to a large extent chemical processes 
in manufacture. Like other industries the value of its products, investment and wages 
advanced rapidly during the war. Chemical and Metallurgical Engineering estimates there 

113 



American Journalists in Europe 

are 1,500 firms in the strictly interpreted chemical field, employing over 200,000 men, 
with an invested capital of $224,000,000 and having a volume of business approaching 
$1,000,000,000. 

Exports — 

Two publications represented among the party are devoted to export trade in Ameri- 
can products: El Reporter Latino-Americano and El Automovil Americano. 

The growth of exports is shown graphically in the following figures: 

(Bulletin, Department op Commerce, May 17, 1919) 
(Year Runs From May to April) 

1915 $2,544,628,445 

1916 3,936,758,850 

1917 6,106,396,653 

1918 6,739,643,968 

Exports of Cars and Trucks 

(N. A. A. C Figures) 

1918 $77,205,825 

The Bankers' Trust Company estimates that the manufacturing capital of 300,000 
plants early in 1917 was $25,000,000,000, and that the total production of manufactured 
products in the United States was $64,000,000,000. If we add to that the $5,000,000,000 
produced in railroads from the investment of nearly $20,000,000,000, and also add the 
farm productions of 1917 as $21,000,000,000, we will have the approximate production 
of the country as $90,000,000,000. 

From the following table it will be seen that the publications represented by the party 
serve a large percentage of this entire productive capacity, and whatever extension of 
information is received as a result of this opportunity will have a far-reaching influence 
with the leading and most important industries of America. The following tables give 
approximate figures of investment and production, and the second tables show the personnel 
of the representation of the party by publications and industries. 

INDUSTRIES REPRESENTED BY THE PARTY 

1914 

No. Volume of 

Industry Firms Employees Investment Production 

Railways 3,000 1,700,000 $19,000,000,000 $4,900,000,000 

Iron, steel, metal, machinery, 

hardware 40,542 1,800.000 6,720,630,000 7,724,705,000 

Textile 80,418 1,136,000 4,500,000.000 4,836,172,000 

Automotive 54,000 800,000 1,250,000,000 3,000,000,000 

Shipping 1,960 502,000 4,500,000,000 500,000,000 

Building 212,000 1,550,000 10,275,000,000 3,700.000,000 

Mining 29,500 1,714,000 4,460,000,000 3,255,000,000 

Electricity 1,355 191,555 10,750,000,000 105,695,404 

Boots, shoes and leather 37,000 370,000 753,000,000 1,105,000,000 

Engineering 275,000 7,000,000 22,000.000,000 12,000,000,000 

Chemistry 1,500 202,000 224,000,000 992,000,000 

Export, all industries 6,700,000,000 

Total 734,920 16,774,000 $84,432,630,000 $48,712,877,000 

114 



LIST OF PUBLICATIONS AND REPRESENTATIVES 



American Architect 

American Hatter 

American Machinist 

American Paint (f Oil Dealer . 

Automotive Industries 

Boiler Maker 

Boot <f Shoe Recorder 

Building Age 

Chemical <f Metallurgical Engineering 
Chicago Daily Hide Report 

Coal Age 

Commercial Vehicle 

Iron Trade if Metal Market Report 

Dry Goods Economist 

Dry Goods Reporter 

Drygoodsman 

El Automovil Americano . . . . 
El Reporter Latino- Americano 
Electrical Merchandising .... 
Electric Railway Journal .... 

Electrical World 

Engineering $ Mining Journal 
Engineering News-Record .... 

Foundry 

Garment Weekly, The, Nugent' s 

Hardware Age 

The Iron Age 

Iron Trade Review 

Lumber 

Marine Engineering 

Marine Review 

Millinery Trade Review .... 

Metal Worker 

Motor Age 

Motor Boat 

Motor World 

New York Daily Hide Report . 

Pacijic Coast Merchant 

Power 

Power Boating 

Railway Age 

Railway Electrical Engineer 
Railway Maintenance Engineer 
Railway Mechanical Engineer . 
Railway Signal Engineer . . . . 
Shoe if Leather Reporter . . . . 

Shoe Retailer 

Textile World Journal 

Transfer <f Storage 



New York H. M. Swetland 

New York R. W. Allen 

New York A. J. Baldwin 

St. Louis, Mo Allen W. Clark 

New York . D. Beecroft, Directing Editor 
New York II. L. Aldrich 



Boston, Mass. . 

New York . . 

New York . . 

Boston, Mass. . 
New York . 
New York 
Cleveland, Ohio. 

New York . . 
Chicago, 111. 

St. Louis, Mo. . 
New York 

Boston, Mass. . 



H. E. Taylor, Representative 

. . . . H. M. Swetland 

H. C. Parmelee, Editor 

F. F. Cutler 

F. W. Parsons, Editor 
D. Beecroft, Directing Editor 
H. C. Estep, Editorial Director 
H. E. Taylor, Representative 
H. E. Taylor, Representative 
H. E. Taylor, Representative 
D. Beecroft, Directing Editor 

F. F. Cutler 

New York A. J. Baldwin 

New York A. J. Baldwin 

New York A. J. Baldwin 

New York A. J. Baldwin 

New York A. J. Baldwin 

Cleveland, Ohio. H. C. Estep, Editorial Director 

R. W. Allen 

E. H. Darville, Editor 

W. W. Macon, Managing Editor 

H. C. Estep, Editorial Director 

.... H. M. Swetland 

New York H. L. Aldrich 

Cleveland, Ohio. H. C. Estep, Editorial Director 

New York R. W. Allen 

New York H. M. Swetland 

Chicago, 111. D. Beecroft, Directing Editor 

New York . . D. Beecroft, Directing Editor 
New York . . D. Beecroft, Directing Editor 

Boston, Mass F. F. Cutler 

San Francisco, Cal. H. E. Taylor, Representative 

New York A. J. Baldwin 

Cleveland, Ohio. H. C. Estep, Editorial Director 

New York S. 0. Dunn, Editor 

New York S. 0. Dunn, Editor 

New York S. 0. Dunn, Editor 

New York S. 0. Dunn, Editor 

New York S. 0. Dunn, Editor 

Boston, Mass F. F. Cutler 

Boston, Mass F. F. Cutler 

New York H. G. Lord 

New York . . D. Beecroft, Directing Editor 

115 



New York 
New York . 
New York 
Cleveland, Ohio. 
St. Louis, Mo. . 



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